Tag Archives: michele wang

Snow’s silver lining: spectacular mittens

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best new mittens knitting patterns

Sometimes I forget that mittens exist outside of storybooks. In my head, they belong to those picturesque, all-white, deep-winter wonderlands — which are (thankfully) totally foreign to my existence. But the nightly news the past few days, along with my Instagram feed, have reminded me that the world is full of people who need, wear and knit mittens. And as it happens, there have been a lot of great patterns released lately. These six are almost enough to make me wish for a snow day —

1. Classic Mittens from the Purl Bee (free)

2. Icy Water by Muraka Mari (free)

3. Adiri by Julia Trice

4. Knoll by Michele Wang

5. Jagged Ridge by Kiyomi Burgin

6. Pinion by Véronik Avery

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New Favorites: amazing colorwork from Brooklyn Tweed

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brooklyn tweed winter 13 adara altair and kimmswick shot by jared

The latest BT collection, Winter 2013, came out this morning and it’s Brooklyn Tweed at its very best. There are eighteen designs presented in the most lavish BT lookbook yet — filled, of course, with Jared Flood’s beautiful photos. (The interlude of Hudson NY scenes is just gorgeous.) Eighteen is a lot of patterns and, while some of them are more to my personal taste than others, there’s not a clunker in the bunch. I’ll be mining this collection for weeks, but what tugged at me most on the first viewing is the colorwork at the front of the book, which isn’t ordinarily even my thing. But this is when I love Brooklyn Tweed the most — when they take classic styles and techniques and make them a little bit sharper, a little bit smarter, but without damaging the timelessness. Pieces worth the precious investment of your knitting time.

— The Adara Turtleneck by Michele Wang puts the colorwork around the waist.

— A little intarsia goes a long way on the Altair Cap by Jared Flood.

— Julie Hoover’s Kimmswick Scarf is miles beyond my skill set, but I would wear it in a heartbeat.

— And I adore both versions of Jared’s take on the lopapeysa, the Grettir Turtleneck and Crew (contained in one pattern).

grettir turtleneck and crew pattern and photos by jared flood