Letters
Biased? Skewed? Bent Out of Shape? Yes!
Dear Kay,
Don’t worry—I’m not talking about the election, my opinions, or the opinions of anybody else.
I’m talking about my scarf.
It’s got a slant to it, I tell you. It started out a rectangle and quickly began to list like a wiped-out mother. The reason for the slant? I’m using a single-ply yarn: the gorgeous, woolly, earnest Rifton that we can’t seem to hush up about.
For those of you who know your plies and twists and whatnot, just move along and go cast on a blanket or something. Anybody wondering what would make a perfectly straight-looking piece of yarn end up as a trapezoidal scarf instead of a rectangle? Pull up a barcalounger.
We turn now to Hymn Number 23 from The Knitter’s Book of Wool, where St. Clara of Parkes explains it all for us:
In Section 3, “Ply Me a River,” Clara writes: “The main issue with singles is balance. The twisted fibers are like a leaning person. They need something to lean on—normally another ply. Without that ply, the excess twist may work itself out by pulling your knitted fabric in a diagonal direction—just as our leaning person may end up tipping over. When you hear people talk about a fabric bias, this is what they mean.”
Like this:
There’s a lot of talk about avoiding bias. I get it, if we’re talking about being fair and kind to other people. But with single-ply yarns, bias is simply a moment when the yarn is being itself. A single-ply yarn does this sometimes. But the benefits of a single-ply yarn are many: it tends to be tender, and loose, and a celebration of the fiber at hand. It feels recently made, rare somehow.
If I’d gone with a knit-purl stitch pattern, it wouldn’t slant. The push and pull of the stitches would even out the twist. But this Belinda Wrap ladder stitch is basically a variety of stockinette, sort of. So it leans.
It may be that I’m susceptible right now to anything that seems genuine, authentic, and honest. That’s what this yarn is to me: it’s still got bits of vegetable matter in it. The colors—Skies over the Cumberland and Central Park Bench—warble a tiny bit. This scarf is going to warm somebody’s neck, and it’s going to be loaded up with love from Jill Draper in the Hudson River Valley and the Green Mountain Spinnery in Vermont. The undeniable bias made manifest in this scarf is the natural twist of a natural yarn, made by good people who are trying hard to make something real.
Here’s to more bias!
Love,
Ann
Love it!
Embrace the skew!!!
How was the bias effct when a while back you made that Belinda wrap scarf from the color chages kind of Rifton? Maybe it is doing that here because you’re actually working with two different hanks of yarn for a color change. Anyway, it is pretty no matter what.
I love the color of your knitting. Also very interesting about the bias I am a newish knitter of just a few years 3 this fall, and I did not know this.
I spot juicy + blah going on there! Very MDK colors.
What effect does a good blocking have? Is is like a summertime Tennessee hairdo – great on Saturday but definitely looking cattywampus by Monday?
Love that word, “cattywampus”.
If I may go off the subject for a moment, I have a question about an order I just placed with my Android phone. I put in my credit card number manually (did not scan) and put in all requested info to make my order complete. However, there was nothing indicating confirmation when I finished the order. How do I know that my order wasvactually received?
Good morning, Diane! We’ll check and be in touch with you directly via email. Thank you for writing!
Thanks!
I ordered some of your Rifton, not realizing that it is a single strand. I understand about it biasing. However, the problem that I have with singles is that it can untwist unless it has been properly fulled. The untwisting depends upon the combination of direction in which it was twisted, and whether or not the knitter is a thrower or a picker. I throw, which twists the fiber in an S direction. If I knit with a singles that has been Z twisted, I am undoing that twist as I knit. In some yarn, that causes the yarn to drift apart. If I knit with a yarn that is twisted in the S direction, I am adding twist, but I have never noticed a problem with that.
I guess the solution would be to learn to be a knitter who picks…..tough thing to do at my age, although not impossible I suppose !
It will be interesting to see how I make out with the Rifton yarn.
I didn’t have any trouble with untwisting when I knit my first Rifton (a Metronome wrap, which is garter stitch) this summer. It is indeed fulled. I had a skein from Jill during our yarn-design phase and asked her why it didn’t feel like my other skein of Rifton and she said, oh I just sent that for color, you need to full it if you’re going to knit it, so I followed her instructions and soaked it in hot water and it completely transformed. All skeins shipped by Jill have been washed in this manner before winding. Please report on how you find it, Judy! (And thanks!)
Thanks, Kay. I shall let you know my thoughts on Rifton. However, that may take awhile, as I am in midst of some charity plus family Christmas knitting…..and I am slow !
So, this will become a narrow Belinda Wrap? Will you be dropping stitches or something? Belinda is so holey while this looks ribbed to me. This yarn looks gorgeous!
Hear! Hear!
Who knew? So interesting. Thanks.
And here was me looking at that first picture and thinking, “How clever to get that perfectly slanted striping – you colorwork experts are so amazing! I wonder what it looks like on the reverse?” And instead I learn something new about singles – thanks 🙂
Also, bit of a sidetrack, but wow, that Belinda Wrap looks Extremely Well Suited for knitting in cashmere laceweight. Possibly in, oh, say a light slate blue and a natural. If a person happened to have those colors on hand. Just sayin’.
Where are the directions?
My Rifton just arrived and it looks and feels so lovely. Will be poking around on your site and Ravelry to decide what to make . . . Can’t wait to get it onto the needles. Love the new website . . .