Updated February 2024.
If you've knitted items by new designers, you might have wondered just how they got started designing knitting patterns. What's their background, did they have an Aha moment? What special skills makes somebody qualified to design knitwear patterns?
Let me tell you how it all started for me.
I learned to sew at a young age, by watching my mom with eager eyes. She wouldn't let me touch the sewing machine, but little by little I was able to learn and gain access to this precious tool. By age 13 I was sewing my own garments, including historical dresses. By then I had a deep knowledge of garment construction and how clothing and accessories are meant to fit.
My mom taught me how to knit and crochet as a kid, and I kept at it on and off (mostly off) until I decided that I wanted to knit my son a sweater. By this point I had been a solid crocheter and had experimented with many different advanced stitches, and had even crocheted garments. But I was relatively "new to knitting" per se. I took a knitting class at my local yarn store, and then I never let it go.
Fast forward about 2 years. I had knit a few sweaters, hats, scarves and cowls, even socks. I was beginning to experiment with cables and other textured stitches. I had recently bought a couple of stitch dictionaries to experiment with different stitches and bring my knitting to a new level.
Then, it happened.
One night, while the kids were asleep, I was sifting through the mail. My favorite catalog appeared in my hands. You know which one. The one you just can't wait to open and browse while sipping a hot beverage in peace. For some it's home design catalogs, for others it's crafts or fashion, but for me, this was the REI catalog. I'm a hiker, runner, climber and I just love the outdoors (in case you ever wondered where this shop got its name). So I started browsing the catalog.
Now you're wondering what this has to do with knitting. I'm getting to it. Please be patient.
I'm sifting through the catalog, enjoying this peaceful moment. I flip the page. And there it is. It happens. It's stronger than I ever thought possible.
I fall in love.
There's this hat, by a famous outdoor company. I just fell in love with it. It was so pretty! I wanted it. I needed to possess it. It came in 3 different colors, and I didn't care, I was gonna buy all 3 colors. It truly was love at first sight. I was excited, elated.
Then I glanced at the fiber content, and my excitement deflated a bit. It was acrylic. I really wished it was wool. I have nothing against acrylic, but I do prefer wool, as I find it keeps me warmer, especially if I'm working out and sweating. But would this be a deal breaker? It was like finding out your crush wears brown socks, or is an accountant (nothing wrong with accountants, I wanted to be an accountant when I started university, but you get the gist).
Mwah Mwah (deflating sound).
But still, I loved the hat so much I was ready to hop online and add it to my cart, in 3 colors. Who cares? I still wanted the hat. Never stop exploring and such. I wished the ribbing was different and aligned with the cables, but something so minor didn't deserve to be a deal breaker. Or did it?
And then, my eyes fell on the hat's crown. The crown. The hat's poor crown. The design of this hat was so wonderful, but the crown was a sore sight for the eyes. All butchered.
Well, maybe it wasn't that it was all butchered, but more about the fact that I had been hand knitting hats lately and realized that hats can have pretty crowns, instead of 4 ugly seams that were sewn in haste by an underpaid factory worker on the other side of the planet. This is what happens when you're a knitter. Things that you didn't care about before now seem monumental. And this was the case with the crown of this hat. (Let's not get into the issue of underpaid factory workers just yet. That's a segway we'll keep for another time.)
I loved the hat, but the fiber content wasn't what I was looking for, the ribbing was all wrong, and it desperately needed a better crown. There was no way, as a knitter, that I could buy, let alone wear the hat, without feeling like I was betraying my craft, myself and the whole knitting community. I sighed.
I kept staring at it, and after a few minutes the idea emerged. I could knit this hat, and make all the changes I wanted to it. Because I am a "Knitter" (picture a knitter with her fist in the air in exclamation). And us knitters, we can change the world, one garment at a time.
I had seen a similar textured stitch from the hat in my new stitch encyclopedia. I knew how to knit cables. I began scheming this in my head, thinking about gauge and pattern repeats. I still didn't know what to do about the crown, but I figured it couldn't look as bad as it did in the picture of the manufactured hat.
So I did some math, figured which yarn I wanted to use, and casted on my version of this hat. At this point I had no idea that this would become my first knitted design. I was just making this for myself.
Then, I don't know exactly when, I had this vision of what the crown was supposed to look like. Really, a vision. It's not really something that I thought through, but something that came to me. In my dreams or in my mind, I don't know, but it was like this was meant to be. Everything in this crown I imagined was perfect.
It was supposed to decrease in the textured stitch section, and keep a star shaped form, until it finally decreased in the cables. The decrease section ideas were so simple, yet elegant, and built like it was meant to be. So I knit it, taking notes.
I loved it so much that I then made a smaller version for my kid, and another one in a different colorway for myself. Then I made a bigger version in a lighter weight yarn. For me, too! Because I wanted 3 of these hats; well now I had them.
And then, I realized that I loved this pattern so much that it would be selfish to not share it with the world. So I wrote the pattern, and had it tested. After all, not much was taken from the original picture I saw in the catalog besides inspiration. The yarn, the cast on numbers, the sizing, the grading, the ribbing, the pattern repeats, the crown were all different.
Right after, I started dreaming about designing a scarf to go with it. And after many rounds of edits, the Adventure Awaits Hat and Scarf were created.
Since then, the patterns have been tech edited, and knit by many fellow knitters who enjoy the finished product just as much as I did mine. And yes, lately I have felt the urge to cast on this hat pattern again. Just for kicks. I made it in green, my favorite color. This is the latest version, and the one my daughter is sporting in the pattern image.
So, I was just a knitter who got inspired by a well known manufactured product. But I was also an experienced knitter, crocheter, and sewist who knows what garments should look and feel like, how to work decreases so they go in the direction you want, what is ease, and all that played in my ability to craft and design this pattern.
As a designer, I'm still learning new tricks everyday. Some days are hard. But sometimes I get this genius lightning idea that makes it all worth it.
Now that I've shared the story, I'm itching to cast it on again. And again. Because yeah, I love this pattern so much.
What can I say, knitters gonna knit.
Get the hat pattern here.
Get the scarf pattern here.