I Knit a Sweater Using Colour Analysis - Here's What Happened
Part 1: Knitting a Sweater According to Colour Analysis
A little while ago, I made a post about colour choice in knitting. This was just after popular yarn brand Knitting for Olive launched the colour filter on their website, which sorts their shade range into undertones and seasonal palettes.
In that post, I wanted to see how colour choice plays a part in the wearability of my hand knits. I was also curious whether colour analysis fit into that equation.
I looked through most of my finished knits to see which ones align with my colour season (Soft Autumn) and which ones don’t. Then, I sorted those piles into ‘wear’ and ‘don’t wear’.
This process showed me that I mostly wear neutrals (shocking) and I have a greater proportion of Soft Autumn-leaning neutrals than not.
But I didn’t feel like I had enough evidence to confidently decide I should only knit with colours in my seasonal palette - that it’s a guaranteed way to produce an object I’ll love.
To properly determine how much colour choice plays into my love of a finished object, I did a bit of yarn shopping. I chose two colours to make two projects with. The first, is a Soft Autumn-approved blue and the second is a Soft Summer-leaning dusty rose.
The rules:
I need to knit a basic project that I want to wear - no experimenting.
I need to use a yarn composition that I like and have tried/worn before.
I need to document my knitting experience with each colour.
I need to assess how much I reach for each FO over the course of a month.
The Soft Autumn Sweater
For my Soft Autumn sweater project, I chose to make the Autumn Sweater by Ozetta using De Rerum Natura’s Gilliatt yarn in the shade ‘Sel’.
I loved working with this yarn! It was soft and squishy with a slight heather that was fun to see knit up.
The pattern was super simple - Ozetta is a great designer for easy-to-read instructions. Although, I will say, the larger gauge did cause some wrist pain as I was knitting.
In total, this project took me about two months to complete. I didn't reach for it daily, and actually had to put it on hold for a few weeks while I was busy.
Final Thoughts
Admittedly, I didn’t find myself particularly excited to work on this sweater over the past 8 weeks. The strain it put on my wrists was definitely a contributing factor, but I also think the very neutral colour was less appealing than some of my other WIPs.
Since the design is such a staple, I know I’ll reach for this jumper loads - I’ve already worn it twice since I finished it last week. However, I had some tension issues while knitting which I hoped would resolve once the sweater was blocked. Spoiler alert: they didn't .
The blocked tension is better than it was, but I’m still not happy with the unevenness of the finished fabric. I think this will impact how wearable I find this sweater.
So, with all that said, I’ll reserve judgement until I finish the ‘out of colour season’ project. That way, I can properly compare the two and see what I think.
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