Orange, pink - and things from far east

• Posted by Kamicha on March 20th, 2008 filed in Project Spectrum

I really don’t understand why didn’t I recall this UFO from last summer. Perfect for this years Project Spectrum first colour theme!

I had few stripes of it done and the rest of it did not take too long, now I need some pink or orange cotton voile to line it perfectly.

I do remember, though, how I got this crazy idea of pink-orange striped sunskirt. I was browsing (once again) Style.com and found this:

I admit that I use fashion photographs quite a lot as an inspiration. The outfit in that image is impossible to pull off with my figure and it has several details that do not particularly attract me. But I found the combination of orange and pink, boldly striped to contrast to the girly feel of those shades, very refreshing. And I love that splash of colour combined to peaceful shades of sand.

First I had some ideas about a silk dress that would combine those ideas in one garment. But on the other hand my wardrobe is full of too dressy dresses that don’t have too much use. So I decided to modify the concept for everyday use and when I saw those delicious shades of Mandarin Petit in the LYS shelf, nicely next to each other, the solution was quite clear for me. The skirt has lightly A-lined silhouette and it is quite short to let some ultraviolet radiation for my pale legs. And actually I believe that it doubles as a top, too!

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A while ago I got a delivery from Amazon Japan.

I can warmly recommend these Japanese stitchionaries. All patterns are presented in very clear charts, so the language barrier is not an issue.

Basic stitch patterns are well presented and numerous, the difference to all western stitchinaries that I know is the selection of large (sts and rows) patterns with great level of detail. These patterns often combine cables and lace, the result is light and three dimensional at the same time. Twisted stitches are very common in these patterns.

One of these books is specialized in lace patterns and is probably more basic level than the others. But I love the idea of presenting multiple variations of almost similar pattern in a compact way: it serves the purpose of picking just the right one for particular project - or in some cases gives ideas how to combine patterns or gradually ghange from pattern to another or to unpatterned surface. Actually all books experiment this in some extent.

And at least one previously unknown technique here! It seems to me that those “background stitches” are knitted helding those two yarns together. For the pattern stitches the pattern color is knitted in front and other colour knitted separately in the backround with reverse stocking stitch. I really should test how this works in practise, allthough I can’t just now say if I can make up an actual project out of this. Exciting, anyway!

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I would love to end my every post to a flash of fresh yarn p**n, but you know, the budget does not allow. Anyhow, at this time of year one can easily argue that now it is the right time to get something new for the summer, and so I left from my LYS with some skeins of this lovely ivory silk. I have a quite clear idea of what it shall be in the future…