I took a class at Edinburgh Yarn Festival with Hazel Tindall to learn fair-isle colour work. I liked my little cuff I created that day, but I sensed that I wasn’t quite ready to dive into making my dream fair isle vest. I mention this, because I still have a fantasy that one day I’ll knit a fair isle vest. When I heard about Susan Crawford’s Vintage Shetland publishing project, I knew instantly I wanted to support it.
So I was delighted when I was offered a sample of Fenella yarn to try out! Susan launched the yarn in March 2014. She developed the yarn specifically for the Vintage Shetland project.
“Whilst working on the Vintage Shetland Project I have hit a snag with some of the garments that I wish to recreate. As most of the garments are from the 1930s to the 1950s, the most commonly used yarn weight in their construction is that all too elusive 3 ply. Added to this was the lack of appropriate colours available in any yarn that did happen to fit the weight I needed. I realised that the only way I was going to be able to successfully recreate these garments was to have yarn produced specifically for them.” – by Susan about Fenella yarn
The Feel of the Yarn
I hand-wound the balls on a long drive so I had some time to feel the yarn and ponder it before knitting. It feels so light and airy! And the colours really did seem to glow. This might be due to the airyness, with light passing through, as well as the natural transparency of wool. But the dye seems to be through the fibres and not just on the surface, if you know what I mean. Here’s a pic of “Baked Cherry.”
Now that I’m more familiar with spinning, I can see that Fenella is loosely plied. The fibers themselves are well spun in each strand, but the plying is loose and open. For comparison, I put it next to the shetland wool to show you the difference. This is Jamieson & Smith 2 ply jumper weight on the left. It’s dyed in the wool, and woolen spun. With the Fenella on the right, you can see there’s a definite lustre to the yarn. The label doesn’t specify the breed, but it looks like a long wool, and it looks worsted spun. (I wonder if I’m on the mark?) It actually reminds me a bit of John Arbon’s Exmoor Sock yarn just in the way it is plied (not the hairy texture).
In the Fair Isle class, Hazel Tindall responded to a question about using superwash for fair isle. Hazel said that superwash treated fibers tended to be “too stand-offish from each other,” the thought of which made me laugh. But it does make sense. The fibers need to grab on to each other. When you steek fair isle, you cut the strands. They fibers will have bonded well enough with friction that they hug each other affectionately. Meaning, they don’t unravel. Because Fenella is a light airy yarn, it would be perfect for colour work. I think this yarn would actually also work well for lace, and if I can think of a project I’d like to see what I can make with these yarns.
There’s also the added bonus that the colours really pop with brightness. Look at this funky Pthalo green!
Working with Fenella
I was given four colours: two light, two dark.
- Myrtle (dark green)
- Pthalo (bright green)
- Delicot (peach)
- Baked Cherry (red)
I took a picture of them in black and white and the lighter colours really looked to be the same tone. For the design, I opted to put the contrasting the colours together light v dark. I decided to refer to the awesome Knitsonik Colourwork book to create a new cuff. And I began doodling!
I started by drawing a grid to fit the number of stitches I needed in the round. I came up with the idea of writing “WOW” around the cuff. I used 3mm needles to knit with. If I were to do this again, I would probably go down to 2.75mm for colourwork, but I’m a loose knitter.
Contrary to what you might think, I didn’t find the yarn splitty. I struggle with that when I purl usually, but of course this was in the round and I only purled for the ribbing.
When I finished knitting I thought my stitches looked pretty wonky. I don’t have much experience with double pointed needles, so I was getting some gaps especially when starting new rounds.
I washed it and squeezed it a bit roughly. After squeezing out the water, I noticed my stitches looked more even and the colours blended better. I literally said “WOW” outloud, and then laughed, DUH. I had to explain this to my husband who did a good job of pretending to be impressed! Here you can see my little cuff swatch drying.
Buy Fenella Yarn
You can buy Fenella Yarn right from Susan Crawford’s shop, Deramore’s and Love Knitting. Oh! And ALERT! There’s a sale on Baa Baa Brighouse right now.
Support the Vintage Shetland Project
At the time I’m writing, the project is 253% funded(!) This is a great chance to not only support her publishing project, but you can get a few little extras too. The Pubslush campaign is on for just a few more hours!
If you’d like to see more of the projects and inspiration – you can check out the blog tour.
