I’m excited and grateful to have a pattern in the current issue of Knitty, the fabulous online magazine. Farrand is, if I may say so myself, a really fun and easy pattern to make. Malabrigo Rios yarn offers up wonderful colors to pair together. Better yet, the fiber is super-soft and a joy to wear.

Knitty Winter 2016 Ferrand Both

The pattern came about when I fell in love with some Malabrigo Rios variegated yarn. I swatched several stitch patterns in a quest to find the one that showed off the variegated colors in an exciting way. Farrand’s stitch pattern causes the colors to pop, especially framed in solid colored accent stripes. Here the variegated colorway is Diana, framed by the nearly-solid Sabiduria.

Farrand Loop Detail_2

Rios’ gorgeous saturated colors also drew me to pair nearly-solids together in the shorter cowl version. I loved the deep golden Sunset color with the rusty-brown Marte. I hope to give knitters inspiration to try their own favorite color pairings.

Ferrand Short Cowl alone

 Farrand includes instructions for both the short cowl and longer loop versions. Both require just one skein each of the MC and CC. The longer loop version can be looped again for a thick and snuggly cowl:

Farrand Loop doubled

Why the name Farrand, you ask? Beatrix Farrand was an accomplished landscape architect in the first half of the 20th century. I love her garden designs. The stitch pattern reminds me of her use of latticework as a way to bring vertical elements to a garden.

A word about Knitty.com…

Knitty has done amazing things over the years to bring creative, fun patterns to the knitting community…for free. We’re all aware that the publishing industry has faced major challenges lately. I heartily encourage all my readers to consider helping Knitty to keep bringing us quality, playful patterns and articles by becoming Patrons.

Resources:

Photography by my very talented friend Gale Zucker

Knitty Winter 2016

Malabrigo Rios yarn