Presenting the Colour Block Cowl

Colour Block Cowl - on sale here

More autumn excitement from me today as I am thrilled to present my latest pattern release with you. Things feel especially autumnal today - as I write this midmorning it’s still incredibly dark outside (I even have the big light on) and the rain is lashing down against the windows. Just right for thinking about cosy autumn knits.

The Colour Block Cowl was knit using 50g of contrast yarn for the 'colour blocks' and a 5 x 20g set of ombre mini skeins for the main colour.

I chose to use a mini skein set from As Yet Yarns, colourway Volcanic Mist, a gorgeously subtle gradient from lightest cream to mid grey. 

For ease of knitting and so that nothing interrupted my 'flow' I wound the mini skeins into a cake before I started. I used the Magic Knit technique for this. If you'd like to try it there's a short tutorial up on my blog to show how I did it.

The cowl is a really straightforward knit with lots of stocking stitch - and it's ideal as a base to practice your colourwork on. You could knit the body of the cowl a little shorter if you prefer. As it is I had about 15g left over and I love that it is deep enough to wear folded over for extra warmth.

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To bundle or not to bundle?

The Coffee Break Cowl

I’ve been mulling over the issue of my older patterns for a while now. Acutely conscious that the downside of using social media to market one’s work means that invariably you actually have to talk about it from time to time (ie mention it in posts, on Instagram, casually drop it into twitter conversations) in order to actually sell anything.

It’s quite un-British and ‘selling posts’ are the thing I struggle with most online. 

As a natural consequence of this I find that I am much more comfortable talking about my newer work as subconsciously or not, I feel that this is of more value to the reader. In reality of course, very few of those who follow me on social media have been following me since the beginning of my designing career. To those stalwart and much appreciated souls who have, however, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

In actual fact, many of those who follow me now probably don’t have a clue about my older body of work - back in the Ravelry days.

It’s for these newer customers that occasionally I overcome my reluctance and schedule a few posts about some of my older patterns - usually those with a seasonal link or something to tie in to current events.

It was after one such post that I received an email which, I have to confess took me back a little. In essence it was someone asking, none too politely, why I felt able to charge for older designs. To paraphrase it was basically “you’ve already done the work and the file is just sitting there, so why do you still charge for it”

Clearly the concept of attempting to make a profit via a semi-passive income is a bit lost on this correspondent - and I’d love to see them argue for a free copy of ‘To Kill A Mockingbird’ in a bookstore - but it did make me stop and think for a bit.

When I shared this on twitter there were a few well-meaning comments about maybe packaging up older designs into a bundle and selling them at a significant discount in order to generate sales. But the more I thought about it the more I thought that to be honest that was even worse than the ‘just make them free’ argument.

Using this approach starts from the premise that there is something inherently less worthy about older patterns compared to newer ones. But this isn’t fast fashion. People are far less likely to only knit patterns from ‘this season’, unlike with clothing where it’s quite common for retailers to mark down ‘end of season’ ranges. 

In a similar vein, who is to say when a pattern is deemed old? They aren’t published with expiry dates. If someone today stumbles across my website and goes browsing around for patterns - please do feel free by the way - to them, all of the patterns they see there are new. They don’t differentiate, I don’t think, between those added this year compared to those that have been published some years previously. They are all equally novel.

Not only does a pattern bundle devalue the actual patterns themselves but I believe it also devalues the worth of my customers. Those loyal souls who actually choose to get my newsletter, who like and comment on my Instagram posts, who share a tweet or take a photo of their latest Fuss Free festival shawl to share with others.

I hate the phrase ‘target customer’ but these people really are the reason why I have a business at all. They are happy to pay full price for a pattern, but also appreciate a new pattern discount or early bird price on occasion via my newsletter.

Chasing after customers who don’t see that they should have to pay for older patterns, or who can only be enticed to buy them at a considerable reduction is not where I want to spend my valuable time.

On a slightly different tangent I’d be interested in how many patterns from bundles actually make it onto needles. From my own personal experience I know that I have bought bundles in the past that have just been filed and forgotten. I might have knit 1 or 2 of them but the remainder have certainly never seen the light of day.

How about you - do you like or value bundles? I’d love your feedback on this.

If you’d like to be notified of my new pattern releases, newsletters and the occasional cheeky early bird discount you can sign up below. And should I ever do a bundle, you’ll be the first to know :)

Shawls v cowls

The PPS

I asked a question on Twitter recently about whether people preferred making cowls or shawls and it generated such a vibrant debate that it prompted me to sit down and think about why we choose to make the things we do. Why we choose one pattern over another. And why in some cases do we choose to make the same pattern over and over again.

There are millions of patterns out there - both knit and crochet. The choice is astronomical, but for many of us we stick to many of the same familiar designers or styles.

In most cases I stick to the mantra of never knitting the same thing twice - life is too short after all. But there are a few notable exceptions. I must have made well over 10 Honey Cowls during my time as a knitter - most have obviously been given away as i think I only have one left in my drawer. I’ve also made quite a few of my own Fuss Free Festival shawls (and not just for sample knitting).

Both of these patterns share common features. They are relaxing to knit, they don’t require very much active thought - leaving your brain free to go off and do it’s own thing. And they both work with a variety of yarns. meaning that you can ‘shop your stash’ at 2am and cast on exactly when the mood takes you. Sometimes the planning of phase of project is enticing and enjoyable - the yarn selection, the ordering, the swatching. But sometimes let’s face it you just want to grab your yarn and needles and get cracking.

Anyway, back to shawls v cowls. Shawls won the day but only by a narrow margin. I do love a good shawl, don’t get me wrong but when it comes to actually wearing my handknits, my cowls are worn far more often than my shawls. Especially these days where I’m rarely doing anywhere fancy. For me, cowls are way more practical for everyday wear.

I guess that’s another point isn’t it. There’s a difference between what we choose to knit for fun (maybe to give away or just ‘because’) as opposed to what we knit because we want to wear the end product. but that’s a philosophical question for another day.

With my mind on all things neckwear I thought I would put together a discount across all my shawl and cowl patterns - running from now until the end of January. Another bonus of shawls and cowls is that they knit up quickly, so if you cast on (and you are in the northern hemisphere) you still have a few months of cosy wear ahead of you. And if you are in the southern hemisphere - well you are just getting cracking ready for autumn.

You can find my shawl and cowl patterns here, and you can buy as many as you like with the 50% discount code WARMTHOUGHTS.

So, how about you - are you Team Shawl or Team Cowl?

Ravelry and me

Wearing the PPS Shawl.

A lot has happened over the last few weeks. The sudden upgrade of Ravelry and the attendant concern and dismay over it’s continued inaccessibility to many have continued apace, and despite some blog posts and half-apologies from Jess and the team there has been very little meaningful progress.

Many people can no longer use the site and this is, put simply not acceptable.

I have talked about this a lot on Twitter and in other social media but I realised that I haven’t stated my position plainly here, in black and white, for posterity.

As things stand at the moment I cannot support Ravelry, nor the decisions taken by the management team. Repeated attempts to engage with them at all levels have failed and it is clear at this point that no amount of ‘people expressing disappointment’ will shake their firm conviction to proceed with their new look.

With this in mind the only option left to me is not to support them financially. I can’t afford to close my pro account - my pattern sales are still significant there and I am a business at the end of the day. As soon as there is a viable alternative I will move but for now I will continue to push sales on my Payhip platform as hard as I can and to continue to pay the (hopefully small) Ravelry sales invoice.

In addition I will not purchase any patterns from the site. If I find a pattern I like and the designer doesn’t appear to have an alternative platform available then I will ask them if they will sell it to me via Paypal.

I haven’t advertised on the site for several years now so this bit isn’t relevant to me but I notice that many designers have withheld their advertising budget - and also the coveted September slots which used to sell out in record time are still currently showing as half-filled. Advertising revenue accounts for 50% of Ravelry’s income so this is the most effective way of attracting their attention.

If you haven’t tried Payhip before, please don’t be put off. It’s a simple Paypal transaction just like you would do with Ravelry. The only difference is that the pattern PDF is emailed to you rather than going into your Ravelry library. But in any case, in order to be sure you can access your purchases it’s always good practice to keep a copy of your PDF - either paper or digitally - after all, if Ravelry were to be unavailable to you then you wouldn’t be able to access the patterns you have paid for. If having the pattern in your library is important to you however, please do let me know after your purchase and I’ll happily gift it to you.

In order to tempt you to try it out I am having a Payhip sale from now until the end of August. Please just use the code PAYHIP50 on any of my patterns for 50% off