knitting on the web

It's just the UK edition, but I'm in Wired magazine this month. My life as a z-list knit-celeb and that of an academic researching science in popular culture collided, and I was interviewed about why there is so much maths and science themed knitting.

Or rather, we discussed the way 21st century gender and geek identities have collided within various areas of the nerd-knitting subculture, and this ended up as a piece on science themed knitting. I got the impression the journalist was more interested in why there is so much knitting on the web, and was just talking to me for a bit of (likely to be unpublished) background. But clearly other deadline/ interests/ editorial constraints came along. There a pretty graphic of a ball of yarn tangling into a double helix, and I'm quoted with the explanation that 'creating 3D objects out of coded formulae - that's what a knitting pattern is'.

Still, it is a shame that the topic of knitting on the web wasn't taken further - it's an interesting issue. Knitting and the web have gone together for a long time. I remember listening to a Woman's Hour piece on female web-use a couple of years back, and some expert (can't remember who) argued that some of the first female-led podcasts were knitting ones. Now podcasting is so widespread, there are a quite shocking number of knitting ones. Perhaps there is an obvious reason why: you can knit while listening to a podcast (some of us read and even type while knitting, but it is easier just to press play on itunes). However, I wonder if the broader point isn't also true: that knitting is always at the forefront of women's uptake of new media technologies.

(I know lots of men also take part in the online knitting community, but you have to admit it is dominated by women).

Arguably, knitting has been there at the start of all the major new media developments of the last fifteen (more?) years, often producing some of the most polished and innovative products. Even in the largely pre-blog days, there were/are knitting listservs. There were/ are also knitting homepages, complete with patterns, advice and knitting calculators, often members of a bunch of knitting web-rings. There was/is some first-class knitting e-zines, even if the notion of the e-zine has generally been reinterpreted/ dissapeared. Today, many of us play with twitter and flickr, various blogs have come and gone, but really its is all about ravelry.

As I said to the journalist, I think we can read this in the same way we look at science-themed knitting: there are a fair number of knitters out there who like code, so its no surprise that computing abilities and an interest in knitting overlap. This is only part of the story though: the web is a way of communicating and helping to form and strengthen communities, and knitting has always been about communities. Whatever media knitters have taken - from magazine to scrawled handwritten notes lent to a member of our local knitting circle, from television to facebook - they talk, share, discuss and deconstruct whilst they click-click away. We should also remember that knitting is a bit weird, and the web does help special interest freaks find each other. Moreover, knitters like making stuff, whether it is coded or otherwise. Knit-themed blogs often contain references to DIY, baking, sewing or other craft: blog-building is part of this too.

It is these last three (non-geek) reasons why, I think, knitting on the web has exploded in the last five to ten years. Today, you don't need much of a nerdish inclination or any specialist computer knowledge to use most online knitting media. All you really need is a desire to share ideas and nose on what other people are doing, and those are much more widespread characteristics of knitters.

So, in the absence of Wired picking up on the topic, and in the wake of the ravelry twitter trend-bomb last week, I'd be interested to know what the readers of this blog think. I only really got into knitting four or so years ago, so I came to the knit-web reasonably late - I know there are some early adopters out there, what was it like on the knit-web frontier? Similarly, what about the newbies/ non-knitters, were you shocked when you first discovered quite how humongous the online knitting community is?

crawling

I have finally got around to PDF-ing Rosalind and Bakerloo, and putting them up on ravelry. As an added bonus you can also find my Bottoms Up pattern and an article about toe-up sock heels (with formula/ pattern).

If you are not on ravelry, then that's your own problem, you freak. Join up.

They are all for free. Please respect (a) copyright and (b) that I'm not here to teach you to knit. By all means contact me if you think there is a problem with the pattern, but if I get another message on ravelry from a stranger who wonders if maybe they should have done a swatch (or simply hasn't read the pattern), I'll scream.

Because I'm feeling maudlin today, I've re-dedicated the Bakerloo pattern to Ken Livingstone, seeing as it was named after London transport. As I said, maudlin. Not just about the new mayor - its other voting decisions, or lack of them that really bugged me. I tried to walk it off this afternoon, so stomped up the hill to look over the view of London from the Horniman gardens. I often go there when I want perspective, I somehow feel soothed by surveying my city. But the skyline didn't work today. So I decided to hide in pretend countryside instead, and went for a muddy walk around Sydenham Hill Woods, which at least gave me a chance to play with my new birthday present (new camera). Hence the photos.

I can't believe I took these, and feel entirely justified in having 'blamed my tools' for the last couple of years.

demi-done

I've taken ages to post about this. I finished in March. It's been hard to find a time when me, a charged camera battery, a photographer and light have all be in the same place, but it's also because I haven't entirely decided whether to give it a thumbs up or down.

Its Demi, from Rowan Vintage Style made in Cash Iroha bought half-price in the John Lewis sale. All details in the ravelry page. I'd been wanting to make demi for years. Faced with a sweater's worth of aran weight yarn after the sale, I was desperate to demi-it.

I checked through ravelry for other FOs in the yarn, and again and again the same line came up "Oh, Cash Iroha, how you do grow!" I knew demi shouldn't be loose, so I asked around and was told it didn't grow that much. And I was good. Not only did I swatch properly, but I washed and seriously blocked it before taking stitch and row measurements. I went down several needle sizes and it all seemed to be on track. But, you can guess. It grew.

The pattern does work as a baggy jumper. The side-shaping and twisted rib keep the looseness of the yarn in check, meaning its still reasonably comfortable and (relatively) flattering. Most people seem to use the hourglass sweater patten with Cash Iroha for the same reason. Still, it's not the image I had of the pattern in my mind. Demi is a tight, fitted and nipped in smart garment, not a big softy-sack. And you have to remember that I've had that image in my head for years.

In conclusion, it's a thumbs up of an FO. But my craving for a demi is not sated. Next autumn I'll make another one in a more conventional yarn. It'll be re-gauged to dk, and as a top-down raglan. Because life's too short for all those back-to-front purls on the WS of the twisted rib, and I think the shoulder button detail will look cute on the raglan angle.

In the meantime, I'm looking for a stitch pattern with virtually no stretch. Any ideas?

unfinished

Ravelry didn't kill the knitblog. If anything, it's inspired more people to set them up. I do think, however, there's been a dearth of work in progress posts since the advent of ravelry. If you know your current new cast-on will make it through friend's activity pages, why blog-up their blogroll too? But there is a place for moments taken to sum up works on the needles; time out to consider the process. It being a messy tuesday I thought I spend some time, on my blog, pausing to consider a few incompletes in my life.

Above is a stole I've just started. Muir, to be precise, and in the yarn the pattern calls for, artfibers Tsuki. It's so rare I ever follow yarn specifications, it came as a bit of a surprise to me to realise I'd inadvertently done what I was told. I think it's going to bit a WIP for a while. I have to look at it when I knit, so not great for knit groups, knitting while chatting at home, or knitting in front of the television. It is small, and I had planned it for bus-knitting, but the yarn's so slippery it's hard to knit on a moving vehicle.

Next, is my Demi, in Cash Iroha bought in the John Lewis post-Christmas sale. It's knitted. It's even seamed, and this shot was taken while it was drying after having been washed and blocked. It is however, still without buttons. I had just over a ball left over of the yarn, so I've cast on for a beret. Neither this, or the jumper itself is especially seasonal. I started this back in January, thinking there'd be plenty of time to wear it this year, but things kept getting in the way. I thought it'd still get a wearing after the snow over Easter (in London, yes, the first snow of the year, a week before we swap from GMT to British Summer Time). But its been raging sunshine the last few days. And not the crisp cold kind of sunny either.

Finally, it's my biggest WIP of all, the thesis. Please note the 'horrible' in the document title isn't a comment on the work, as much as a reflection of the case study. As I seem to be saying to people daily at the moment, it's ok, it's getting there. It's getting there slowly, but it is going to be 90,000 words (plus or minus 10,000 words or so), good-quality words at that, so you shouldn't expect speed. And it is getting there.

paddle power

On saturday we took the Paddlesteamer from Tower Bridge to Whitstable (my pic here). It went right down the Themes, then out to the sea, via Southend. You could walk around the middle of the boat to see the steam engine at work and take a peak out of portholes to see the paddles go round and round. Plus, I wasn't the only person knitting on deck. All very exciting. Slightly cold too, which allowed some re-discovery of FO's gone by.


One the left side, a slightly better shot of my squirrelly mittens. On the right, Marcus is wearing a pair of mitten-topped gloves I made ages ago, pre-blog (loosely based on the broadstreet pattern). They've lasted really well, he wears them all the time. Marcus also caught me engaging in some sneaky yarn sniffing.


A 'ps' for ravelry users: I'm a stupid person and had "messaging" switched off for a load of last week. So if you messaged me, friended me or left a comment and didn't get a reply, give me a poke.