Stranded knitting is when you work with multiple colors throughout the project. If you were considering starting a Yell sweater by Marie Wallin (we shared this pattern last week), or if youve ever done colorwork previously, no doubt you want the extra effort to stand out and be as beautiful as possible. Learn how to work the long tail cast on and how to estimate the length of yarn needed with our clear step by step tutorial and video. The dominant or foreground colour is held with the left hand, and the background colour is held with the right hand. Stranded colorwork knitting is traditional, stunning and looks so intricate! So its extra important to watch out that your floats are consistently loose enough. The color that is the drawing is the dominant color and should always be held in the leftmost position. Thanks. Get everything included in Premium plus exclusive Gold Membership benefits. You wrap one strand around your index finger with a forward loop (it looks a little like a yarn over) and the other strand the exact other around, back to front. If you are holding both yarns in your right hand and knitting continental style with both colors, place the contrast / dominant color further to the left than the main / non-dominant color. It's an important concept that will help your color knitting look even more perfect, but not 100% necessary at first. You always want your pattern color to be held dominant so that the pattern stands out from the background. The light grey (103) is the background colour, and the purple (142) is the foreground colour. . Block your work before you judge it. Michele shows another swatch where vertical columns are created with stranded colorwork. Pick a knitting method There are three main ways to knit in the stranded style. In stranded color knitting (often called Fair Isle knitting), two or more colors are used on each row. In fact, I wrote a whole book about it. C. In the left hand image, the purple (darker) yarn is held above the white yarn as it travels into the next stitch. Carrying Two Yarns in Your Right Hand for Stranded Colorwork, https://pdxknitterati.com/2019/08/01/yarn-color-dominance-tutorial-and-soldotna-update/, 24/7 Access to Premium Knitting Videos, Projects, and Tips, Step-by-Step Instructional Demos, Patterns, and Tutorials, 50% Off Video Downloads Purchased in The Knitting Cirlce Shop, 2 Full-Length Video Downloads to Watch Offline, 3 Full-Length Video Downloads to Watch Offline, 5 Full-Length Knitting Classes to Keep for Life, Discounts on Purchase-to-Own Content in The Knitting Circle Shop. The finished cowl is 10.5 inches tall and 24 inches . Floats can be tricky when the item is going to be something that you wear. The top half of the swatch - or the top three rows of the motif - was knit with the white yarn held lower. When working colourwork in this way, you simply pick up the strand thats the correct colour for the next stitch, knit it, and then drop it to pick up the next colour. On the top half of the piece, the navy stitches look a little bigger than the white stitches. I find the way I do colorwork (continental holding both yarns on the same finger with a special ring) that the yarn on the left makes larger stitches than the yarn on the right. Thank you for your feedback. You can even carry both in the same hand, as long as you orient one to be left and one to be right. In this video, Jen Lucas discusses all things scissors. Reversing the dark and light colors should be equally successful. While focussing on playing with colours and practising knitting with dpns and a belt I got distracted from paying attention to the arrangement of my yarns. When working with two colors in the left hand, keep the yarn orientation on your finger the same as on a right-side row and the dominance will be correct. Each row I do gets 1 peg farther away from the anchor peg. Get exclusive premium content! That makes the stitch just a little bit taller, and that stitch will be dominant. As we knit, the completed stitches tend to bunch up on the right needle, making the width of the fabric seem narrower than it really is. Writing to a colleague about "The Focus," that loose-knit group of politicians and journalists and socialites that informally coordinated anti-appeasement information and activity in the late 1930s, Churchill once described it as a coalition seeking support especially from 14 . Automatically applied discounts will also be shown there. Jan 28, 2021 Did you know that when working with stranded knitting, the way you hold the yarns determines which color will "pop" out a bit more. AtomicAthena 8 yr. ago Save BIG on yarns while supplies last! A bold Icelandic-style yoke printed with a spirograph of interlacing chevrons is striking on anybody. Please join us on Sunday, September 5 from 11am-12pm for a complimentary workshop to learn two-handed, stranded knitting. Enter in your email and password to create a FREE account. How does ease affect inclusive size ranges? Customer accounts enabled in your Store Admin. Hence dominant colour it makes the pattern pop more against the background. The visual is better for comprehendsion. This method is popular for a reason - its quick and efficient, plus you look bad-ass doing it! It's important to make sure that you're always stranding your colors in the same way throughout a piece, because switching the dominant color will change the way your colorwork looks. As you gain experience you might find that you can hold both strands in your right hand at the same time. In that case the most important thing is to be consistent. She once again discusses color dominance, as each section of the vertical columns was worked with a different color as the dominant, or prominent, color. our Privacy and Cookies policy. Keep the blue in your left every time you knit. Color could have a major impact on the look and feel of your finished piece, whether you choose one color or many. At this interesting & informative session you will learn the basics of stranded colorwork, color theory & dominance. You may not see this on a single roundbut over a few rounds, it can be very obvious. Learn how to work the long tail cast on and how to estimate the length of yarn needed with our clear step by step tutorial and video. Understanding color dominance allows a knitter to determine . Advertisement Coins. Yours looks consistent and beautiful! This isnt cheating! Look at the little mini-diamonds (circled in red) - the bottom stitch doesn't join up properly with the others and the diamond shape is lost. Im not sure how to translate it to an English knitter, however. Talk about knitting and your creations. Try colorwork with this quick project The pattern colour should always be dominant but its easier to tell which is the pattern and which is the background on some charts than others. ), How I wrap floats every other stitch. You hold them this way to keep the strands separate and have it easier to pick the correct yarn. I had looked into it because mine was looking really wonky - turns out I was switching which way I was holding the colors, which, like others have said, is the one thing to watch. We will continue to listen and work hard for your complete satisfaction. All Rights Reserved. Color dominance isn't about how you hold the yarns, it's about which color floats travel closest to the work (dominant color) and which furthest (non-dominant color). With one yarn held in each hand: It's worth trying all three methods and seeing which suits you. K2 Yarn A. K1 Yarn B - add in the accent color by knitting the next st and . Check back often, we're always restocking! Because knitted stitches are just one continuous strand of yarn, you can redistribute that yarn from stiches that are too loose into stitches that are too tight. I have to go up at least two needle sizes in order to maintain my gauge when switching from Stockinette to colorwork. The strands can easily become twisted around each other if you always bring the next colour up in the same direction, which can also cause the pattern to recede and look little murkier than it would otherwise. If you willy-nilly switch which one is where, your stranding will show differences. To work a stitch in the foreground colour, maneuver the right needle tip so that it goes beneath the background strand, then bring up a stitch from the foreground yarn. Usually, the yarn on your left will be dominant over the one on your right. If you set down your knitting, then later pick it up again, remember the correct positioning when setting up the strands around your fingers. Certainly for items with all-over stranded patterning, you will wish to swatch in stranded knitting and not rely on your single-color gauge. The only thing thats changed between the two swatches is which colour was dominant on each row otherwise theyre the same pattern in the same colour combination (except for one row on the first swatch where I was trying out the the other background colour). With the background colour held on the index finger, it'll always be kept above the foreground colour to maintain colour dominance. If you were considering starting a Yell sweater by Marie Wallin (, The Art of Crochet: Understanding Colorwork Techniques, Benefits & Tips of Crocheting, A Stress-Relieving Hobby. In this video, Michele Lee Bernstein demonstrates how yarn color dominance in stranded knitting works. How can I control it? This will naturally be consistent across a row as long as youre not dropping the yarns and picking them up again when switching colours. While 'which hand you hold the yarn in' can indicate which yarn dominant, it isn't always, because it depends on the order the yarns are crossed when you bring them in at the back. the now-stranded investigators are unsure whether they can trust their own eyes, their instincts, one anotheror even themselves." . Trapping Floats Chapter 8. 24/7 Access to Premium Knitting Videos, Projects, and Tips, Step-by-Step Instructional Demos, Patterns, and Tutorials, 50% Off Video Downloads Purchased in The Knitting Cirlce Shop, 2 Full-Length Video Downloads to Watch Offline, 3 Full-Length Video Downloads to Watch Offline, 5 Full-Length Knitting Classes to Keep for Life, Discounts on Purchase-to-Own Content in The Knitting Circle Shop. They are experts about color work with years of experience. Crochet is one of those activities that can have a profound impact on our wellbeing. 10 Tips for Knitting Socks MAP TO OUR STORE STORE HOURS Monday - Friday: Saturday & Sunday: 8am to 5pm Closed OUR TEAM Kathy Muhr, Shipping Supervisor kmuhr@brownsheep.com Holding the dominant color so that the floats are below your non-dominant color is how you do it. Choose single or double rib for the hem, cuffs and neckband according to your liking. For the prominent color, the strand is lower, meaning that a little more yarn goes into the stitch, making it slightly taller and more prominent. 7. One yarn will be carried below the other, and that makes it travel further to get to the needle. When working color work, one color will always be the dominate color which will "pop" out of the fabric, while the other color will seem to recede. But how exactly do you manage multiple strands of yarn at the same time while maintaining the pattern gauge? Discover and download free patterns for sweaters, accessories, blankets and more! The strands can easily become twisted around each other if you always bring the next colour up in the same direction, which can also cause the pattern to recede and look little murkier than it would otherwise. Regardless of how you hold your yarns when working stranded colorwork, the float of the Dominant Color should always be stranded below the Background Color. In stranded color knitting (often called Fair Isle knitting), two or more colors are used on each row. Pattern dominant Background dominant Then consistently hold the pattern color in your left hand (and use the picking/European method to work stitches in the pattern color) and hold the background color in your right hand (and use the throwing/British method to work stitches in the background color). IMHO stranded work should be done in the round. I think you should be able to adapt those to one hand stranded knitting. Here it is in action: I would like to see a video on how to work with 3 or more strands of yarn for Stranded Colorwork (Fair Isle). Here is what our expert had to say: We dont currently have a video for that on our website, but Ive added it to our list for the future. Here are the most common methods of holding your yarn for stranded colourwork. I've switched which color is dominant for one round or even some stitches in a round and then switched back; I find a single stitch in the other color works best as dominant for me. This is a wonderful pattern to learn stranded colorwork. In this sample piece, I held the orange yarn dominant on the right side and the green yarn dominant on the left. 4. When Holding One Color in Each Hand: The Dominant Color is held in the left hand and strands below the Background Color on the wrong side of the fabric. Talk about knitting and your creations. SLIP, SLIP, KNIT (SSK) The ssk decrease is a left-leaning decrease., Cable knitting can look complicated and fussy, but its actually fairly simple once youve mastered the mechanics. . Our patterns feature inclusive sizing, clear directions, and lots of support so you can be confident of a beautiful new addition to your wardrobe. This is called color dominance and weve shared the basics on understanding and implementing this concept below! Yarn dominance occurs because one yarn's strand travels slightly farther than the other, making it slightly tighter, causing it to recede, and be less dominant. Spread out your stitches. Kitchener stitch is a knitting technique used for grafting together two sets of live stitches, most often stockinette stitch. Below is a swatch with a color work motif. This method also keeps the two yarns from tangling, and is generally the quickest way to work stranded colourwork (once youre comfortable with it). 31K views 1 year ago How To Knit Take your colorwork knitting to the next level with our Color Dominance tutorial! Manually manipulate unruly stitches! for me it is harder to see the mechanics in my mind as I have never been taught but have been reading on my own. The basic idea is simple: knit each stitch in the correct colour according to the pattern, carrying the unused colour behind and across the back of the work. The Knitting Circle Video Membership, Hi Pat, Some of that extra yarn naturally transfers into the stitch, making the stitches in the lower yarn bigger. We value your opinion, and it will help with the development of our online streaming community. So you can imagine that my work isn't very consistent. I was wondering what happens with colour dominance when you have more than two colours per row. Stranded colorwork gets its name from these strands of yarn, commonly called floats, that travel through the back of the work. Browse our exclusive collection of notions from AcademicHobbyist to keep your next project organized and easy! Looking at the back side of my knitting, the darker color is riding near the needle, and the lighter green rides below the dark green. This will help to prevent vivid colours from bleeding one into the other. If you can look at a piece of colourwork you have done, with the knowledge you have now, and you can't see which colour is dominant or any difference between different sections then you're not making a mistake, you're just most likely always bringing the new colour in the same way which is a perfectly fine thing to do. A. This is referred to as color dominance and a quick explanation is that when stranding 2 colors, one of them will physically fall below the other one as you work. Shipping calculated at checkout. Press J to jump to the feed. Three Color Stranding by Knit Picks Tutorials on February 13, 2012 Three Color Stranding Share Watch on This simple technique shows you how to easily handle colorwork patterns that use more than two colors within the same row, great for Icelandic and other Scandinavian motifs. Depending on your pattern, you may need to switch colors quite often, such as every few stitches, so it is important to have a comfortable way of holding your yarn strands. Stick the right needle tip into the next stitch to be worked. Arbor is a classic DK weight yarn with timeless versatility. In stranded knitting, one yarn will appear slightly more dominant than the other. Learn to knit: How to knit in the round with double pointed needles, Learn to knit: How to knit in the round using the magic loop technique, Knitted Gift Ideas for you and your loved ones, Celebrating our Porty Hat Preview Knitters, How to pick a garment without a model for you, Closed ring cable increases and decreases. I found a tutorial for that on YouTube, which you may find helpful: https://youtu.be/vEzWdMlKj_Q. This is known as color dominance. The biggest challenge with two-handed colourwork is getting even tension between the two hands. Because Ive been going back-and-forth I really have no idea. An age-old craft, weaving has recently experienced a comeback in popularity. It is perfectly 100% okay to not have a dominant colour and not all stranded colourwork has a dominant colour - there are some methods and techniques where genuinely, colour dominance is not a thing. Once youve learned cable knitting basics, youll be ready to knit all sorts of. Sometimes in a stranded knitting project there are stretches of stitches in one colour of yarn that span a length of more than 3cm (1.5). It is on You Tube. Things to watch out for: maintaining colour dominance. Instead of binding off and sewing two edges together, you can use a tapestry needle and yarn to join the stitches completely seamlessly. The color below ends up with more yarn than the one thats stranded above, making the stitches in that color larger and causing them to visually pop more than the stitches made with the color thats stranded above. Thanks!! When knitting with two colors, the two yarns cant be in exactly the same place. Three strands of lofty, woolen-spun Targhee-Columbia fleece are gently spun together into a plump yarn that looks like a single ply and has greater tensile strength and stitch definition than a true unspun yarn. The garter stitch rib pattern is a textured stitch pattern that is perfect for creating items such as a knitted hat or scarf. Quick trick: take a black and white snapshot of your yarns together to see how well they contrast. Working Two Colors: Knitting in the Round Chapter 7. After working 4 stitches in your main color you work 1 stitch in your second color. Playing around with yarn dominance can make a big visual impact in your stranded color work. it is hard to see it in your mind., For me a vidio In Swatch 1 the dominate color was white. But I encourage you to embrace the challenge and give it a try! In the bottom section of the swatch, the white checks are more prominent. To begin, Michele shows a swatch of a two-color checkerboard pattern. In stranded knitting, as the yarns travel along behind the work, one strand will be below the other, and that strand will be slightly more prominent, its stitches just a fraction larger, than the stitches of the other strand; as you can see if you draw the strands of yarn along the back of the work, it's the strand . Yardage used: Approximately 115 yds per color So now we know that colour dominance matters heres how it works. I made a color work hat once doing the opposite of what I should have done for dominance and ended up remaking it as the design was muddled in the first one but was crisp in the re-do. Livonia MI 48150 #fringeandfriendskal2015 #tutorial #howto #knittingtechniques #Tokul, A post shared by Andrea Rangel (@andrearknits) on Oct 5, 2015 at 9:27am PDT. If you look closely, you can see that the orange crosses stand out more on the right side of the work. We will always recommend swatching to ensure you are satisfied with the final outcome, but have fun playing with this technique! Break the rules. If you're using a technique that has a dominant yarn then all you need to do to avoid switching them unintentionally is ensure you are stranding them in the same order - background colour under or background colour over. I just love this Reddit channel, I learn so much. When knitting with two colors, the two yarns can't be in exactly the same place. If you hold one color in each hand, the easiest way to manage color dominance is to hold the Dominant Color in your left hand and strand it below the Background Color on the WS of the fabric. Just remember to always end up with the same color "on top" to avoid tangles (aka, color dominance ). A provisional cast-on can be used anytime you want to pick up live stitches from your cast-on edge, either to knit in the opposite direction from or to create a seamless kitchener stitch join. I know this has happened several times when I loom knit. The one on the right is a bit distorted at the edges because the swatch was so tiny. The yarn on your right rides closest to your needle, and the yarn on your left travels from underneath to make a taller stitch. To work a stitch in the foreground colour (purple), pick up the strand from BELOWthe background yarn. How to catch floats in stranded colorwork knitting on purl and knit rows, including videos of how I knit colourwork with two hands. The 'dominant' colour is the one that pops more or is more prominent because the stitches are slightly larger, from the floats being slightly longer as they run beneath the other colours. You can do this every 3-5 stitches or, if you have a whole lot of really long floats between color changes, you can catch the floats every other stitch to create a consistent fabric as is shown in the videos (I did this for my Knitters Dudesweater shown above. This is usually done by tensioning the yarn around the pinkie and ring fingers and holding the one strand over the index finger and one over the middle, as in this video. Look at the photo above. Switching which strand is held to the left or right of the other creates starkly different results in colorwork knitting; this concept is known as "color dominance." The "dominant" color in a pattern is not necessarily the same as your MCin fact, it usually should be exactly the opposite. Stranded color work is when you hold multiple colors of yarn (most often two at a time) and follow a chart to make designs in your knitting. Here's how I wrap my background color when I'm working with the dominant color. I dont agree with this comment/ idea. As long as you consistently hold the same colour in the same hand, the yarns will automatically be in the correct position, under or over, to maintain colour dominance. By this I mean which yarn is stranded over the top of the other at the back of the work when it is not the colour being knitted with at the time. A provisional cast-on can be used anytime you want to pick up live stitches from your cast-on edge, either to knit in the opposite direction from or to create a seamless kitchener stitch join. Sometimes its obvious like in the Boreal Toqueshown below (the gray is the background and the blue creates the pattern in the hat on the left, and the gold creates the pattern and the brown the background color in the hat on the right), but sometimes its arbitrary. Stranded Colorwork Workshop. To go along with our new Colourwork Club accessory patterns, weve put together a series of blog posts to walk you through your first stranded colourwork project, along with tips and tricks perfect for all levels of experience. The Knitting Circle Video Membership. Keep each ball of yarn on its own side. Yarn Color Dominance in Stranded Colorwork By Michele Lee Bernstein Yarn color dominance. Powered by Mai Theme. Think about which one you want to pop more and call that one the pattern color. In the top section of the swatch, the dark checks are slightly more prominent than the white checks. Usually keeping the yarns in the same order at the back (dominant to the left/dominant underneath) will take care of it - advice to always hold them in the same hand assumes you are using one hand to hold each yarn, which not everyone does; some people use a thimble or tensioner (in which case you keep the yarns in the same slot), some people drop the yarns in between and some people hold all the yarns on the one hand, whatever works for them. The yarn traveling above and moving a hair farther will produce tighter stitches making them appear slightly smaller on the right side. And yes, you can also throw both yarns using your left hand! Tax included. Here are seven quick tips that will immediately improve the look of your color work. Yarn bowls and project bags can be handy for this - just use two instead of one! We have a video coming soon to The Knitting Circle about color dominance.