Knitting - For Speed and Comfort
Keen to speed up your knitting, use both hands for colourwork or give your dominant hand a break? This class is for you!
Teacher: Julia Billings
Workshop Duration: Half Day
Description: This class is all about increasing your options for how you hold and work with your needles and yarn. There is no “best” way to knit, only what meets your needs for any given project, and you should come away feeling confident to use a combination of knitting styles.
You’ll be guided through the major differing styles- English, Continental, Portuguese and Lever- and learn the pro and cons of each. This session is completely hands-on to allow you to practice and fine-tune each of the various styles. It should also be an opportunity to observe and learn about the styles of those knitting around you!
Materials: Please bring 50gm of 8-10ply yarn and both your preferred style of needles and (if they are not straight) a pair of straight needles (30-35cm) in the corresponding size.
Takeaway: Students will take away the knowledge and confidence to work a variety of different knitting styles, as well as comprehensive notes on the techniques covered.
Level: Adventurous beginner/ Intermediate. You must be able to easily cast on and off, knit and purl.
So I wrote last week a post asking “Is my making fast fashion?”. And then I did a video on Instagram discussing similar topics in a slightly different way. And as always, you lovely humans have helped me clarify some of my thinking with your thoughtful, clever commentary.
And while I think there is so much more to discuss, here are four key possibly-more-meta ideas that have come up for me out of those conversations.
In using the quote last week that suggested that there was no single answer, and suggesting that this was freeing, I really did mean that we should sit in the grey. Not that the lack of “an” answer to this question should mean we get to ignore the question but rather that the lack of “an” answer means that we need to keep asking bigger more beautiful questions. And keep asking them.
Is my making fast fashion?
Am I living my values or merely thinking them?
And how can I make those two things a little more aligned in this moment?
These are my big beautiful questions.
Yours might be different.
And importantly this leads to point 2.