Tag Archives: koigu

Another Trip to the Koigu Tent Sale

Posted on by under Fiber Friday

It happened again! For the third time, we made the trek to the Koigu Tent Sale in August.

It was much busier this year, and it poured rain on the way there. I had a plan, though.

First, I wanted yarn for a pullover in the current issue of Pompom Quarterly. It’s called Ixchel – you can see it on the front cover of the issue preview on the PomPom site, or follow the pattern name link to the sweater on Ravelry. I chose these two colours of Koigu.

I’m a bit concerned that the blue mix might have too much going on for fair isle work, but I’ll do a swatch and see. I bought enough of the blue that I could knit a pullover in just that colour, just in case. 🙂

My second mission was to get a single skein of Mori (a silk and wool blend) in a darker colour that coordinated with the Mori I bought two years ago at the sale. I’ve chosen a pattern called Tranquil Mist and have just about exactly the right yardage. That makes me nervous, so having this purpley-black skein is a kind of insurance: if I run out of the turquoise Mori on the right, I can finish with the darker colour.

The red I bought because, well, it’s red and beautiful. I have four skeins of it and love it to bits so it will be used for something.

What about the Koigu I’ve bought at the tent sale before? Well, last year, I bought a kit with ten skeins in ranges of purple and a pattern book. I’ve knit one shawl, which used half that yarn:

Charlotte's Web shawl, knit by Deborah Cooke in Koigu

That’s the other five skeins in a row on the floor. You can read the blog post about the finished shawl right here – Charlotte’s Web.

I’m also working on a cardigan in one of the colourways I bought the first year. The pattern is called Juicy Gloss and there was a post about it here. I’ve made some progress on that one in the last month or so and will show it to you when I finish the body. I’m about halfway down the lace bit, but the rows are long so each one takes a while.

What have you been knitting lately?

And what do you think of my new Koigu?

Making Stripes

Posted on by under Fiber Friday

It’s time to talk about knitting again!

I finished my Earth Stripe Shawl and immediately started on another famous knit – Charlotte’s Web. This is a design from Koigu that requires 5 skeins of their KPPPM. (Koigu Painters Palette Premium Merino). You change colours gradually as you knit the shawl, so there’s a gradation thing going on. The original pattern shows a heavy fringe, but I don’t like fringes. I decided to just use up all five skeins and make the shawl bigger.

I bought a bundle of ten skeins in shades of purple at the Koigu tent sale last summer (with a pattern book) and had a lot of fun this fall switching them around in various combinations. (These ten-skein Paint Packs are illustrated on the KPPPM page. Scroll down to see them all. Mine is the Royal Purple – you’ll be able to see why I had a hard time choosing one!) The first three in my shawl were the ones at the top left that obviously went together to me. The others, hmm, required some consideration.

Koigu KPPPM pruples

Here’s the shawl so far. This is about 2.5 skeins in, a little less because I kept a good chunk of the first skein to knit a contrast hem at the end. Charlotte's Web shawl, knit by Deborah Cooke in Koigu

The two caked up skeins at the bottom right will be my next two colours, then I’ll do a hem of some kind in the first colour. I’m using the two of the skeins at the top right of the first picture – the middle one in that picture is #4 and the inky one below it will be #5. The other five skeins are for another shawl, in the order of the second photo. Maybe I’ll start with the pinky one at the right and just make another Charlotte’s Web. We’ll see.

This shawl is a really lovely knit. The lace repeat is easy to memorize, so it’s my tv knit. There are a lot of comments on Ravelry about the instructions being confusing, but I haven’t found that – maybe because I just used the chart for the lace. Since taking this picture, I’ve almost finished with the fourth colour. This one is really going to bloom when it’s blocked!

What do you think?