Knit & Knag Designs

The Indie-Gift-A-Long (GAL) running during November and December consists of 177 independent designers banding together to offer you wonderful patterns.  The GAL is already well under way, and there are lots of lovely projects being knit up and displayed in the Ravelry Group.  If you’re not already there, go check it out.  There are lots of opportunities to win all sorts of prizes, and aside from that, it’s great fun to see what others are knitting.

Part of the fun of the GAL is to get to discover designers and you may have not yet heard of.  So on that note, I have been talking to Mirella of Wool + Bricks.

When did you start to design things?

Like many people, I started out modifying patterns because I wanted something specific and couldn’t find a pattern for it. I started drawing my own charts a few weeks after learning to knit, then calculated and made my own pattern for chevron fingerless mitts within a few months, so my knitting was fairly intrepid from the early days. Yet I remember feeling blown away by the discovery that a woman in my knitting group in Glasgow had knitted her cardigan without using a pattern. As a brand-new knitter it seemed like the impossible!

What would you say have been the big challenges in designing and releasing patterns?
There are new challenges at every turn, but there are some constants: the big one in my decision-making process is always sizing, while the big one in my production process is software.

Regarding sizing, I try to be as inclusive as possible in the sizes I make my garments available in and there are limitations to how well I can get the same design to fit in at both ends of the sizing scale. There can be days of sheer frustration when working on a particular construction that just doesn’t grade neatly into some sizes.

As for software, I try and keep my business open-source, using free programs for the production process of my self-published patterns. Most other open-source users will understand when I mention how long-winded some programs makes the simplest tasks! What makes things worse is that I have experience of using Adobe CS and I know how streamlined it can be for the same tasks I’m wrestling with Scribus to perform. But it’s an ideology thing. I like to imagine that one day open-source will be the pinnacle of both hardware and software technology, so I need to be the change I want to see.

Do you have a favourite type of item to knit?
I’m fairly obsessed with yoked sweaters, particularly the style of Bohus Stickning. This comes in hand with my obsession with Scandinavian indie pop throughout my teen years and student days, and my obsession with Scandi-drama TV series that developed fairly recently (alongside obsessive sweater-knitting, of course!). One of my first knitting books was Sheila McGregor’s Complete Book of Traditional Scandinavian Knitting, and one of my most-recent purchases was Mary Mucklestone’s 150 Scandinavian Knitting Designs, the second-ever sweater I started knitting was Kate Davies’ Paper Dolls, and the last pattern I followed was Létt-Lopi Vest by Védís Jónsdóttir. It’s fair to say this is a prolonged obsession!

Are you more of a process knitter or a product knitter?
I’m a dialectic knitter! (For anyone who hasn’t seen Ryan Gosling’s brilliant explanation of dialectics in Half Nelson, you can watch a montage of it on YouTube:http://youtu.be/t1Lo3P-Dp4Y).

I look at a cool technique or interesting texture and think “I have to learn how to do that”, but I’m also fixated on the functionality of objects and don’t really have things in my life that I can’t use, so there’s an antagonism there between “beautiful” and “useful”. I have to find a way to incorporate cool or interesting with useful or functional. And, inevitably, my synthesis is colourwork yokes! Well, of course there are other items, but there’s a lot of colourwork-sections-on-a-stockinette-background…

I notice you’ve released a few sweater patterns, including Whiteleaf in the recent issue of Knitty. What was your inspiration?
I designed the entire sweater around the handspun yarn I used for the yoke contrast colour. No joke! It had a definite character to it and was very evocative of a time and place, so I worked about 20 charts and swatches of various leafy concepts until I had it. Then the sweater was constructed around the sort of use I anticipated it getting with a cold-weather, outdoorsy yoke design: slightly deeper armholes for additional layering, longer length to keep warmth in, snug cuffs and hem with 2×2 ribbing. It’s definitely a sweater to be worn over thermals on days when the air has a snap to it.

How you chose which sizes in which to offer it, and do you have any thoughts on the grading process?
I’ve thought about sizing for as long as I’ve thought about writing garment patterns. To be honest, it was one of the things that held me back for a long time. I know the data for the smallest and largest sizes is a bit shaky and I am still not confident of the proportioning in the standard measurements, but we have to use the tools available to us!

I decided to write my garment patterns in the widest range of sizes I feel competent grading to, so you’ll find my earlier patterns don’t accommodate such a wide range of sizes as my more recent ones. At some point I hope to go back and up-grade (ha!) these.

I begin grading at the start of the design process, and the grading-design-grading is a feedback loop that sometimes takes way longer than I’d hope. I feel it’s important to spend time on every question mark, because nobody should feel their size was insignificant to the designer. Every time someone knits one of the sizes I am newer to grading for (and is happy with the fit) that spurs me on to continue pushing those boundaries.

With Whiteleaf, I felt confident combining the design elements and construction into a range of sizes that I felt was inclusive. Having spoken to designers who do cover a wider range of sizes, it was clear that there are knitters out there who love it when patterns are published in their size range. Every single grading frustration I faced was worked through with these knitters in mind, and I really hope I did alright.

How did the GAL go for you? What did you like about it (if you did)?
I love the sense of coming together. Most of us work independently on our designs, in our homes or studios, and our only contact with other people doing the same thing is on Ravelry (I know there are pockets of designers who meet in real life and encourage each other in nurturing communities, but they’re the lucky ones!). The GAL recognised this and turned it into the basis for a collaboration. We used our existing marketplace and products, and medium we communicated through, to create an entirely new form of marketing. It was really exciting in the early stages, watching the ideas foment in front of my eyes, and seeing new relationships forming.

What were your most popular patterns?
Laddow was my most popular pattern during (and since) the GAL promotional period, with Amina coming second. Both are slightly tricky colourwork projects, which are a personal favourite, so I’m really pleased there is demand for this type of pattern.

Would you participate again?
I will definitely participate in future, although I feel the project will always be of greatest benefit to those most able to use social media for both individual and collective promotion. Being hugely Facebook-averse, there’s a limit to how much I can contribute, but I’ll offer what I can and hopefully it will be enough!

What’s next for you?
I’m trying hard not to over-commit to all the exciting opportunities that appear all over this field, because it feels like the market is still expanding and the demand is ever-growing but I’m an economic cynic and keep expecting to wake up one morning to discover a bubble has burst!

On a more positive note, I’m venturing into menswear design for the next couple of months, with some more women’s garments in the pipeline, too. Some collaborations, some publications, a rich mix of everything. It’s a good place to be!

If you would like to win a copy of one of Mirella’s patterns, leave a comment with the name of the pattern you would like to win before midnight on Dec 26, 2013.  I will select a winner (by random number generator) on Dec 27.

The winner from last week’s interview was lmecoll.  Congratulations Linda!  The pattern will be sent your way by Sarah as soon as possible.