swatch – Page 2 – New England's Narrow Road

Do you ever wonder how color-work knitting can be done flat? I’ve wondered if that is possible because I’ve only ever done color-work in the round.

Well, mosaic knitting is not really the same thing, but it can have the same effect with a pattern knit into a flat item, like a scarf, shawl, or cardigan.

I’ve been keeping my eyes peeled for my next sweater project. My top choices are either a stranded colorwork pullover, or a cardigan. Unless I do steeking, which I’ve never done, a cardigan can’t have patterning on the body because it’s flat knitting. Color-work is done during circular knitting. Unless… you do mosaic knitting.

The Boho Style Mosaic Cardigan pattern caught my eye. I love Bohemian styles. And this loose, flowing, cardigan has beautiful color-work on the body and sleeves. It is done with mosaic knitting as the name suggests.

Printable Mosaic Knitting Chart For a Swatch

If I am going to commit to knitting a big sweater using mosaic knitting, I’d like to know how it’s done. Before I began wading through bad YouTube videos, I thought I’d look for an article online explaining mosaic knitting. The Interweave site has a good article with a little chart to print out.

Basically if you can knit, purl and slip stitches, you can do mosaic knitting. It is a fast and easy way to create an interesting pattern.

I chose Chart 2 from the Interweave article. This chart does not show the purl side rows, but you don’t need them. (Read my article about how to read a colorwork chart.)

If chart knitting is not your thing, believe me, you will catch on quickly anyway. This little chart is great for a beginner. Once you follow the first couple of rows it will make sense, and you won’t believe how easy it is.

Go to the Interweave page and print out Chart #2.

mosaic knitting swatch — Quick swatch to practice mosaic knitting

How to Follow This Mosaic Knitting Chart

Read the chart beginning at the bottom, reading right to left. This may seem weird, but that is how our knitting goes – we knit our stitches right to left.

I simply knit back and forth for the first few rows before beginning the chart.

Row 1 is all dark triangles and it’s all knit stitches in the darker color (green for me). At the end of the row, turn to the wrong side and purl all stitches to get back to row 3.

Now add the white yarn beginning at row #3. Knit 2 white, slip the next green stitch. (To Slip: put the needle in purl wise in the next stitch and slip it onto the right-hand needle… simple!) Continue across the row and turn to work the wrong side.

For the back of the work – the purl side – all stitches are purled with the color yarn you are holding. The other color stitches you come to will be slipped. There is no need to follow a chart because you can see the stitches you just knit as you come to them. If you just finished knitting with green, you will now purl those stitches with green. White stitches are slipped.

Also, wherever the yarn is – front or back – it will stay there while you knit or purl. On the Right Side / front of work, you will be knitting so the yarn will stay in back while you slip stitches. On the Wrong Side / back of work, you will be purling so the yarn will remain in front while you slip.

slipped stitches knitting mosaic swatch — Slipped stitches on back of swatch

All Purl Sides, back of work: Whatever color yarn you are holding – purl the same color stitches and slip the others!

For the next row, grab the correct color yarn – in this chart the dark triangle means the dark yarn – and begin knitting – and slipping the V blocks in the row. The yarns will travel up the side of the swatch as you change colors. This is not the best edging, and I would do something different if I were truly knitting a garment, but it’s fine for the swatch.

This is a very easy way to add an interesting pattern to a garment and I think the style itself looks a bit Boho! I don’t know yet if I will knit the Boho Style Cardigan, but at least I know what mosaic knitting consists of.

Mosaic vs. Fair Isle

For the mosaic type of knitting you are only knitting with one yarn at a time compared to Fair Isle where two yarn colors are held to knit a pattern across a row. That makes mosaic knitting quite easy to do. It can be worked on circular projects as well.

Fair Isle has a smoother finish as you can see in the images below, which are projects of mine. It’s a lot of fun to do, but must be used for circular knitting projects only. Cardigans can be knit in Fair Isle, but steeking is needed… yikes. I haven’t worked up to that yet.

This makes mosaic the perfect choice for adding designs to anything worked flat – including a cardigan.

Fair Isle mitt in stranded colorwork — Turkish patterned cap

Pictured projects L-R: Turkish Patterned Cap, Fair Isle Mitts (free pattern), and Wild Angelica Socks.

YouTube Videos on Mosaic Knitting

If reading how to do this type of knitting is confusing, a decent YouTube video can help. Unfortunately I can’t find any really good videos on this, but this one shows mosaic knitting in a shawl. It’s not exactly the same as I’ve described here because she is not purling the back of her work and the slipped stitches need the yarn in front for the slipping. But it shows a pretty way to add color to a shawl.

This video shows how to follow a chart, but as usual, there is a lot of talking. I didn’t watch the whole thing.

Free Mosaic Knitting Patterns

Mosaic Baby Blanket – Purl Soho
Mosaic Cowl – pattern at Ravelry
Ballband Dishcloth – Ravelry
Study Hall Shawl – Ravelry
Amethyst Wish Toque – Ravelry

As I was browsing Instagram the other day I saw some beautiful handspun yarn photos. Taking a chance, I clicked the website link and there before my eyes were beautiful, colorful skeins to purchase! It wasn’t cheap, at $38 a skein – see the store link below this photo – as would be expected for good quality yarn of this type – but finding handspun yarn in such lovely colors is nearly impossible, so I jumped in and ordered two skeins.

Pink and tan handspun yarn — New handspun! Beautiful..!

Wound Up Fiber Arts

Wound Up Fiber Arts is the name of the shop where I purchased the bright pink “Fire Starter” and lovely “Toasted Coconut”, and I’m so glad I did. Today – the day I am typing this – they are offering only roving or top (not sure that is the correct term), fiber, to be spinned into yarn. There is not one skein of yarn left for sale. Of course that will change, I’m sure, but it’s hit or miss unless you keep up with the postings of such a site. On Instagram they admit to being “sporadic”. And that seems to be the way. This beautiful type of yarn doesn’t come off a machine. It is painstakingly crafted.

I believe that a lot of people who spin their own yarn use it themselves! It’s hard to get buyers to understand the higher price, so I understand.

Sample Swatches of the Handspun

For my swatches here I used a size 7 needle for the pink, and a size 10 for the tan. Each swatch is only around 25 stitches across, but I wanted to see how the colors looked knit up.

When I look at a skein or ball of this yarn I can’t imagine how it will look in a project. When knitting a hat or sweater using this yarn for colorwork, each shade will carry a longer way so the colors will slowly work their way up the garment.

Bright pink handspun yarn — “Fire Starter” handspun

I always wind my hanks of yarn into a ball because I don’t have a winder. This yarn was easy to wind and I found no knots. I just love the colors of this pink. It’s so soft and quite a big skein too. Both are over 300 yards.

Sample swatch handspun pink — Fire Starter yarn color way knit up

Tan "Toasted Coconut" handspun yarn — “Toasted Coconut”

Handspun swatch in tan variegated — “Toasted Coconut” sample swatch knit on size 10 needles.

I think I’ve found a hat I’d like to make where this yarn could be used. Hats are one of my favorite items to knit. The swatch will be ripped back now that I’ve seen the colors.

I ended up using a little of this yarn to create a little baby hat and it came out so cute!

Three little hand-knit baby hats — Baby size hats

Finding More Handspun Yarn to Purchase

Many types of yarn are hand-dyed, but not all that many are also hand-spun. With any luck you may find a yarn maker who is happy to share how they came by their wool / fiber and explain the process of hand-spinning it into lovely knitting yarn. I purchased a large skein of blue variegated handspun yarn from Clarion Call Fiber Arts on Etsy, where she explained that some of the fiber used in the yarn came from her sister’s bunny! The brown skein below is from her as well, but it is very scratchy.

I’ll admit that after buying Wound Up’s yarn and Spincycle’s yarn, I prefer those over Clarion Call’s, for color and softness. But, Clarion’s yarn is rustic and I decided to knit a hat.

two skeins of hand-spun yarn — Hand spun yarn by Clarion Call shop at Etsy

I ended up knitting this ribbed hat with the blue hand-spun. I love the rustic look with the fuzzy rabbit fur. It will keep my ears warm on these cold Florida winter mornings… LOL.

Bunny fur hat — Beanie made from hand spun yarn

Handspun yarn is time-consuming to create, and that is probably the number one reason it is in short supply. I’ve read articles about how spinners create these lovely collections of color and it’s interesting. It can be done using a drop spindle or a spinning wheel. But there is a lot involved, and I am no expert. YouTube has numerous videos on the subject of hand-spinning.

What to Knit With Handspun Yarn

I now own five skeins of variegated handspun yarn. I need to find a way to show them off in projects!

On Ravelry and Instagram the main knitting project using Wound Up Fiber Arts yarn is socks. Yuck, I dislike making socks. This yarn is too pretty to go on my feet, so I will save it for something like stranded colorwork on a sweater or hat. Although I see why people use this yarn for small, circular knitting. Each section of color will make pretty stripes.

Mill-spun with similar appearance of hand-spun

Andrea Mowry of Drea Renee Knits has a shawl pattern called “Nightshift” that I’ll bet you are familiar with if you knit anything at all. This shawl is all over the internet and has been knit by thousands of people! And she often calls for handspun yarn in her patterns. This is how I came across Spincycle yarn. The problem is that many of Spincycle’s yarns are not in stock, and especially those lovely colors needed for Andrea’s patterns.

Spincycle’s yarn is really lovely, but these skeins contain 200 yards only as compare to the yarn above, and each skein is around $32.

Spincycle yarns — My two skeins from Spincycle Yarns

Here is a pullover sweater named “Shifty” which calls for 4 different colors of Spincycle handspun yarn. If I wanted to knit this sweater I could only buy 1 of the 4 colors named in the sample pattern (at the present time) because the other three are sold out.

Handspun yarn is especially pretty when combined with other colors and used as colorwork. As you knit the contrasting color pattern the variegation of the handspun adds even more uniqueness to the design.