Telling stories, knitting stuff
Pattern Collections
At the heart of Knitting Tales are the pattern collections. I work with designers to digitize and make available patterns, that for a variety of reasons, have not been available digitally. This includes seeking out designers or their heirs to craft agreements on compensation. Knitting Tales is also the home for my own patterns. These patterns all come from a desire to tell a particular and personal story. Please click below on a collection to learn more about the patterns.
In 1998, Betty Lindsay the owner of Yarns International in Bethesda, took a trip to Shetland that changed the wool world. After meeting Oliver Henry of Jamieson & Smith, a partnership was developed that led to the creation of a new line of yarn, Shetland 2000 (now sold as Shetland Supreme Jumper Weight) in nine natural colors of Shetland sheep. You can read more about the story of Shetland 2000 here.
To help sell this new line of yarn, Betty and her partner Bonnie Hassler, commissioned several designers to create patterns. Among the most prolific was Ron Schweitzer, who designed over eighty patterns, most of them in stranded colorwork.
I have been knitting for over forty years and I love the work of many designers. But sometimes I want to make something that tells a more personal story. These are usually small accessories, such as mitts and hats.
In 2020 during the most intense period of isolation, I was spending a lot of time thinking about the experience of making changes in your life and of reversal. Sometimes it just depends on how you look at things. The Reversals collection of mitts was my tribute to four of the women in my family tree who faced adversity and changed course.