Knitting – Make Your Own Style

heart02Welcome to KnittingBrain.com. We’re here to keep you up to date with the latest in the world of knitting. Everything from gorgeous new knitting yarns to the latest knitting books.

Our aim is to review knitting products and knitting books, share tips and ideas for making your knitting progress more smoothly, help you with your yarn substitutions and to generally share our love of knitting. If you also love crochet, check out our sister site CrochetBrain.co.uk.

Try our knitter’s personality test and find out what your strengths and weaknesses are, plus get tips for branching out based on your personality profile.

There is a cautionary tale about things that will eat woolens and other animal fibres, complete with pictures of what to look out for, see our knitwear care section for more details.

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 New FREE Knitting Pattern

Brighten up your winter wardrobe and bring some colour into your knitting with our new, free ‘Greek Tea Beanie’ knitting pattern. This stranded colourwork beanie hat is an ideal project for learning how to do stranded knitting.

Don’t forget our other free patterns. There’s the simple 1 row lace scarf, easy 3 stripe ribbed beanie and a basic ribbed hat pattern.

Our quick and simple free patterns are ideal for the beginner or impatient knitter.

Free 3 stripe beanie-pattern
Free lace scarf pattern
Free simple ribbed hat pattern

snob-yobNew Yarn Snob Quiz

Are you worried you may have become a yarn snob? How well do you know your yarns? How well do you treat your yarn stash?

Take the test, find out if you really are a yarn snob or a yarn yob.

Yarn Snob Quiz

Latest Knitting Goodies

John Arbon Devonia

14 beautiful shaded lovingly made from a blend of 3 Devon breeds – Exmoor Blueface, Devon Bluefaced Leicester and Devon Wensleydale.

Each breed contributes a different quality to the yarn. The final yarn has an amazing sheen to it making it ideal for special projects and luxurious gifts.

Available as 4-ply and DK, both 100g skeins.

Rowan Camello – Limited Edition

What knits up like DK but is as light as 4-ply? The answers is the new Camello yarn from Rowan.

Having seen (and squished!) the sample knits I was really impressed. The finished knits have the feel of luxury fine knits. The chainette structure allows the yarn to be knitted as double knit yarn because the yarn plumps up when washed.

There are currently 10 shades all with a subtle colour variation which gives the final knits an extra element of interest.

68% extra fine merino / 18% baby camel / 14% nylon
Chainette structure
25g / 175m
Needle size: 4mm
27 stitches x  41 rows to 10cm x 10cm (4″ x 4″)

Free patterns are available on the rowan website.

Sirdar Colourwheel

This new yarn from Sirdar is wound as a cake so you can see the colours clearly. The colour runs are nice and long giving good stripes of colour. It’s a DK yarn that will work well for accessories and kids items.
80% Acrylic 20% Wool. 150g/568y /520m
Needle size: 4mm
22 sts x 28 rows to 4″ x 4″ / 10 cm x 10cm on 4mm needles

Knitwear Fashion Trends

Knitted Handbags

The Dolce & Gabbana Autumn/Winter 2020 collection showcased an array of knitted handbags. Knitted bags give you the freedom to play with bold textures that might not be ideal for garments. Choose yarns that won’t stretch too much or make sure to line your bag with fabric.

Ready, set, sock!

Now is the time to start your sock knitting. Socks are small, portable projects ideal for taking with you on holiday.

Stripes, Fair Isle and Sleeve Shaping

Use stripes to add a pop of colour. Stripes are also being used to add interest to sleeves. Just a couple of well placed stripes can lift a plain sweater pattern.

Fair Isle yokes are starting to appear in knitwear collections. If you don’t want to invest the time into a full Fair Isle yoke knit then try a Fair Isle cowl. Another cheat is to knit stripes with 2 strands of yarn, blurring the colour changes by knitting with 1 strand of each colour during the transition between 1 colour stripe and the next.

Sleeve shapes are becoming more varied. Look out for balloon sleeves, banana sleeves, fluted sleeves and oversize sleeves.

Knitting brain News

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