Alex Tinsley’s “So You Want to be a Knitting Designer” ebook is a primer on the ins and outs of being a knitting designer. Her easy writing style, comical antidotes, and no holds bar advice from experience gives a full purview of the career. A must read for all budding designers! After a short introduction, Alex dives into the essence of the job – writing patterns: what goes into a pattern, how are they formatted, how much information to include, what peripherals might be needed, etc. You might have 1001 fabulous pattern ideas, but it is essential to the career to be able to convey those ideas in a manner in which other knitters to reproduce the intended FO (finished …
Indie Design GAL – Eco Pattern Highlights
Eco crafters, welcome to the Indie Design Gift-a-long on Ravelry! With over 11,000 eligible patterns, I thought I’d highlight a sampling of some of the many eco patterns in today’s blog post. For Her:Tangent, a quirky tank, by Melissa Lemmon (knitterleigh) knit in (my favorite) Blue Sky Alpaca’s Skinny Cotton – 100% organic cotton sport weight yarn & accented with Be Sweet Bamboo – 100% bamboo yarn. Yeats, a quick shawlette, by Corrina Ferguson (picnicknits) knit in Our Humble Castle Soy Beautiful – 100% soy light fingering yarn. For Kids:Ryker, a textured vest for play or church, by Katya Frankel (bingeknitter) knit in Knit Picks Simply Cotton Organic Worsted – 100% organic cotton yarn. Evie, a cute overtop, by Justine …
Indie Design GAL Pattern Reviews – Hats
Last week: “Well I’m up a creek without a paddle, but thanks to Ravelry, I now have a paddle! It just started snowing & my two nephews are coming up Saturday from Texas without cold weather gear. This is EMERGENCY knitting. All other projects are put aside until I get hats for my precious nephews! So thankful for the Indie Design Gift-a-long and scoring this great pattern! After sending me my nephews’ head sizes, I got a PM from my sister, ‘and just in case you are wondering, my head is 21.5 inches. So all total 3 hats to knit in 1 week!” Now that my precious boys are gone & I’ve caught my breath (and the 2646 posts in …
Indie Design GAL Designer Highlight – Jenise Reid
One of my favorite parts of the Indie Design Gift-a-long is getting to know other designers. My first designer highlight of GAL 2014 is the estimable Jenise Reid – femininebydesign. Prolific hardly does Jenise justice, with her portfolio of 108 designs, 30 of which are 2014 new releases! So grab your organic tea, it’s time to dive into Jenise’s interview! If you could only knit/crochet one item type of item, what would it be?Sweaters. As much as I enjoy a quick accessory, I tend to think of them as things to be made between sweaters… Which of your patterns make for really great gift knitting?The bootcuffs, or the headbands, depending on where you live. They are fast, don’t use a ton …
Indie Design Gift-a-long (GAL) 2014 Launch!
Indie Design GAL 2014 is here!! 293 indie designers from 21 countries have banded together to create a knitting & crocheting gift-a-long of epic proportions! Join our group on Ravelry, search the list of participating designer to find patterns you can’t live without, post your intent in the appropriate thread, and start crafting. To entice the yarn love a bit more, select patterns will be on 25% off sale November 13th (8pm EST) to Friday, November 21st, (11:59pm EST). Just use coupon code: giftalong2014 in your Ravelry check-out. To simplify the search, all items included in participating designer’s Ravelry bundles: giftalong2014 are on special. Click here to see the list. KAL/CALs will run from Thursday, November 13 at 8pm (US-EST) …
The Second Annual Indie Design GAL 2014 Is Coming!
“The Gift-A-Long is coming, The Gift-A-Long is coming!” Call out all Ravelry indie knitting & crochet designers, sign-ups are in just a few days! All the information you need, as a designer, is available in the private GAL planning group on Ravelry here. If listening is more your speed, the Indie Design GAL Admins (Nina Machlin Dayton, Simone Kereit, Alex Tinsley, and I) had the privilege of being interviewed by Creative Yarn Entrepreneur Show’s Marie Segares a few days ago about what the Indie Design GAL is and how to become involved in our second annual event. The podcast is posted here! It’s almost time to get your gifting on!