Designer Spotlight: Meg Myers

We are lucky enough to work with Meg Myers here in our Billerica office. She is not only an accomplished knit and crochet designer, but also our graphic designer and web administrator. She is the most willing of all of us to get in front of a camera, which pretty much makes her our permanent de facto Web-Letter model. Visit her Ravelry designer page to get an idea of just how prolific she really is (36 original designs and counting)!

How long have you been designing?

I taught myself to knit during my senior year of high school in preparation for the long commute from my hometown in southern Colorado to college in Boston. I've been "designing" ever since.

I grew up in a rural farming area without a LYS, and Ravelry didn't exist yet, so I had no idea there were so many patterns and resources available. My choice was either to knit garter stitch scarves and dishcloths forever or make it up as I went. Do you know how many cool things you can make (should I say design?) with just a rectangle and a seam or two?!  Purses, pillow covers, sachets, table mats…

Eventually I happened across one of the Stitch'n'Bitch books and learned read patterns. However, I never developed the discipline to follow patterns as written. If I hadn't grown up in such an isolated area that forced me to be creative, I may never have started designing.

How did you get started publishing designs?

While in school, I got a job part-time at my LYS and was finally introduced to the endless array of yummy yarns, magazines, patterns and talent in this industry. It was consuming (in a good way) and I wanted a way to combine what I was studying at school (advertising) with the craft I loved. I already had original designs, so it felt natural lay them out and offer them to the online world. 

What's the first piece you ever designed (not necessarily for CEY)?

The first piece I set out to design was the Soft Linen Beret for Web-Letter 135 in April of 2010. I knit two at the same time, one to practice the stitches and decreases, the other to confirm the design was working. It was comically difficult – the lace panel up the side was my solution for a double decrease that would have required moving the beginning-of-round marker. Now I know that moving the marker would have been no problem, but at the time it seemed like an impasse.

However, I didn't feel like a real knitwear designer until finishing the pattern for the Soft Linen Wisteria top from Perennials. Designing one sweater was easy. Designing a yoke, top-down sweater in six sizes was a feat! That was for CEY's Spring 2011 collection, and I haven't slowed down since!

What pieces did you design in the Fall 2011 Collection? 

In the CEY Fall 2011 collection, I have one sweater, Watercolor in Magnolia, and accessories: Delicious in Chesapeake, Painterly in Magnolia, Crystal in Ariosa, Sheaf in Woodland and Adorn in Wool Bam Boo. 

What is the time line for one of your designs, from swatch to pattern to sample?

I like to sketch, swatch early and let the design grow in the back of my mind for a few weeks. Then I write a tentative pattern and begin knitting, modifying the pattern as I go. Recently I wrote a cap pattern and knit the piece in two days, all based on a few swatches from months ago. An upcoming wrap pattern took me three weeks of swatching and charting before the pattern was ready to be knit, then the knitting took a few more weeks.

Do you use test knitters? 

Normally I do all of my own knitting so the design can evolve. Occasionally when the stitch and not the shape is the feature of a particular pattern, I will swatch until it is just right, then pass the pattern on to a test knitters. Watercolor was knit by a test knitter and she did a beautiful job!

What is your "design process"?

When a design comes to mind, I sketch first and write a few important design notes with the sketch. Usually I sketch with a yarn in mind because what makes the yarn special is often the same thing that makes a pattern work. Then it's on to swatching, swatching, swatching. I put the sketch and swatch away to ripen for a few weeks. Then I write the pattern and only after that, do I cast on. While knitting, I tend to make a few more changes the pattern – another reason I try to do most of my own knitting.

Where do you do your design work? What does your "creative space" look like?

I keep my notebook in my purse at all times, just in case inspiration strikes.  For pattern writing, I have a desk below a skylight with all of my tools at arm's reach. My home is I decorated with yarn that is organized in cubes, just like at my LYS, with swatching yarns in bowls. I also have lots of plants, light and one very interested kitten.

Recently I started a blog to be my online space – www.my-meg.tumblr.com. It's just a place for my daily musings, inspirations and random photos. Like my real space, it's simple and full of fiber.

What is your favorite design? What was your inspiration? 

"Whatever is new" tends to be my favorite, only to be replaced by the next new design. This week I really like the Kumara Filigree Cap, but I still think the Magnolia Healthy Heart Hat is pretty great. I just finished a lacy design for the Web-Letter and it might be my favorite design ever, stay tuned to see the whole thing!

Things to do with Liberty Wool Print!

I've always loved Liberty Wool...what's not to love? Squishy, soft, machine-washable, and the perfect gauge, it suits me completely. As soon as the first Liberty collection came out in fall of 2010, I cast on for the Elizabeth sweater ("the Magic Sweater" as we called it around the office), but made it in a solid color. As a knitter that tends to shy away from bright colors, Liberty Wool Print took a little longer to embrace, but the compulsion hit me hard.

As soon as this week's free pattern was completed, Meg and I both cast on the Splash of Color cowl, one in each new colorway (12 new colors are being released this spring as part of our retailer subscription program). Meg's is in Berry Brambles, mine is in Golden Pagoda. The colors are bright, but what a great way to add an accent color to your outfit.

If you love cowls, this pattern from Kelly J. Knits, the Key to Warmth Cowl, knit here in Liberty Wool Solids and Prints, is brilliant.

We also dressed up our office with Liberty Wool Print. Machine-knit, the installation is 60' total length in 20 colors of Liberty Wool Print...overall 8900 yards and 8 pounds of wool with 73 color changes!

Putting the Liberty "knitdown" on foam core for our office decoration.

Finished! All 60 feet of it!

Downtown Knits in North Carolina has another beautiful display idea using the Molly scarf, one of our best selling patterns. Owner Michele Riggs knit one ball of each color into a scarf, and as new colors are released, she just adds a little more to it.

Betsy, the owner of Classic Elite Yarns, knit up a Log Cabin blanket (with the help of the Mason Dixon ladies) in multiple solid and print colorways of Liberty Wool.

Hub Mills Store here in N. Billerica knit up a chair cushion in each color to soften up the chairs for Knit Night. You also catch a glimpse of the Aldred scarf over the chair, an independent design that uses Liberty Print's color variegation very cleverly.

How do you use your Liberty Print?

Happy I Love Yarn Day!

While we love yarn everyday here at CEY HQ, this is a day when we should all celebrate our craft. The Craft Yarn Council has designated October 14 as I Love Yarn Day! How are you celebrating today? By casting on a new project? By finishing up that basket of WIP's next to the sofa? Maybe by buying that special skein you've had your eye on? Here on the CEY blog, we thought we'd share what's on our needles in celebration of this day. Let us know in the comments or on our Facebook page what you're working on today!

We have two projects in Liberty around the office. I just finished up this Aran Baby Pullover in #7850, a rich gold color. This is leftover yarn from my Elizabeth cardigan from last year...

Speaking of the "Magic Sweater", Meg is working on her Elizabeth sweater in Liberty Print, color #7897, Sunrise. The twisted stitches on the cuff are an inspired choice, twisted rib is so much neater than 1x1 rib. Aren't the colors perfect for Fall?

Cheryl, aka Snuzy, is on her 19th and 20th sweaters of the year and just completed Arabesque in Pirouette. She is also polishing up her Nikko cardigan in Portland Tweed and Twinings from Twist Collective in Magnolia.

 

Tonia just completed her Abstract shawl. It is SO soft and elegant in Magnolia in the Granite colorway.

I have many things in the pipeline for Fall! This box of yarn under my desk is destined for great things:

• Black Princess: another Elizabeth of my own.
• Silver Princess: Tonia Barry's Element cardigan. 
• Moorland: a slouchy, comfy, oversized Grandpa cardigan--pattern improvised, but loosely based on Jared Flood's Redhook Vest.

There are also quite a few Highland Flings around the office. What do you think of this little be-bobbled garter stitch shawl? I've heard it's quite fun to knit...

Lodi Office Knit-a-Long!

It's not often that one pattern lands on more than a few queues in the office. With our own gorgeous patterns to choose from, and so many fabulous indie designs in the knitosphere, it just seems that we never meet in the same spot. Then there was the Lodi cardigan.

You might remember this little cardigan designed by Tanis Gray and knit in Solstice, from the Summer issue of Knitscene. As soon as I saw it, I knew it had to be mine. I do so love a tiny cardigan, often to my detriment, but that's a whole other story. Anyway, one thing led to another and before we knew it, it was on the needles of eight women in our office! Experiences were mixed, from love for the stylish simplicity of the design, to difficulty with the grading, to a newfound appreciation for the wool-organic cotton blend we were all suddenly knitting in.

Solstice is from our Verde Collection, and comes in twenty vibrant colors. The cotton component keeps the stitches crisp and clear, provides structure, and allows the finished garment to breathe. Super soft merino wool adds warmth, drape, and helps pieces hold their shape. I truly dislike weaving in ends, so I was especially pleased to learn that it can be spit-spliced (or "magic-spliced" if the thought of spitting in your yarn is especially unpleasant for you).

What, people don't dress alike at your office?

For those with a larger bust, take heed of your shaping! The eyelet raglan shoulders MUST be increased with each right side row, so while increasing bust size you also increase the arm size! Many who were knitting above a 38" bust had trouble with arms being too large, and remedied it in a variety of ways.

Heather (in the Azalea colorway) merely picked up stitches instead of casting on in the armpit, and knit the sleeves flat, taking in stitches in the armpit. Meg, in the Brass Button colorway, swatched carefully and recalculated the distribution of the fronts and arms. I made mine as is, but wondered in retrospect if you could pair each eyelet increase with a decrease in the armpit area--an unproven theory, but I wonder if it would work? What are your tried-and-true fitting techniques?

Meet Snuzy! (aka Cheryl)

Cheryl is a member of our Classic Elite team and works at the Hub Mills Store, our little outlet store here in Lowell. A big joke around the office is that Cheryl completes a sweater weekly in time for Thursday Knit Night. It seems like there's always something new to block, photograph or ogle! Since I'm fascinated by how prolific she is, I thought you would be too, and asked her to write about it.

Chelsea has asked me to do a guest blog about my sweaters. She and several other people seem to think I have an excessive amount. So I checked my Ravelry page—(I’m Snuzy on Ravelry). Out of my 140 projects, 62 are adult size sweaters, coats, and tanks. (Please don’t tell my mom—she thinks I have 40 and says I don’t need anymore. Obviously she is not a knitter)

33 out of the 62 use Classic Elite Yarns. 13 use CEY patterns too. Disclaimer—I work in yarn retail and am surrounded by beautiful yarns every day. And yes, I am very lucky to have this job, but there are bad things about it too. I get to see and often try on the sweaters that will be in the next season’s pattern books. And I barely have those patterns in the store when the following season’s models are floating around the office. So right now I’m working on Western in CEY Avenue in carnation from the new fall line (update: Cheryl was wearing her Western yesterday at work. Man, she can knit fast!). I have picked a color of Pirouette to make Arabesque. Others on my Must Make list from the fall line include Afternoon Light in Kumara, Oblique in a pretty rose colored Princess, Nikko in Portland Tweed, Pinnacle in Vista, and Peinture in Inca Alpaca (which I haven’t used yet and I’m really looking forward to). So will I have time to finish all of these before the spring line is out?—and from what I’ve seen so far, spring is going to be a beauty too!

So, how do I pick a favorite sweater to talk about? That’s kind of like picking a favorite child—except picking a favorite child is easier. This past spring I’d have to say Honeysuckle in Firefly was my favorite. It was my first time using Firefly and won’t be my last. (There is a dress pattern on Ravelry that will be out soon using Firefly, and I think I’m going to have to make it.) Honeysuckle is the perfect sweater for knitters who hate seaming. The only sewing was the buttons. I actually like seaming, but this sweater was love at first sight when it appeared at the Classic Elite office. Honeysuckle is top down, raglan, and the shaping is built right into the charts so you don’t have to worry about eliminating yarnovers as you decrease. My biggest problem with this pattern was picking a color. They are all beautiful!

Of the remaining sweaters in my projects, about 20 more use Classic Elite Yarns for independent designs—quite a few from Twist Collective. I’m supposed to start Twinings from the new Twist Collective in Magnolia next week. But I’m trying to finish at least one of the three on my needles right now before then. And I think Vista would be perfect for Crane Creek. I’m definitely going to have to increase my usual 2 sweaters/month output to get to all of the sweaters I have to make.

So you can see that although I have an enviable job, it isn’t easy keeping up with the prolific designers and yarn selectors at CEY. If I could only grow a few extra pairs of hands or at least knit in my sleep, life would be easier. And of course, I have to thank my loving, patient, best husband ever who never complains about my knitting even though dishes are in the sink and we had leftovers again for dinner.

Happy Knitting
Cheryl

Friendship Bracelets from Purl Soho

Purl Soho recently posted a tutorial on how to make friendship bracelets on their blog at PurlBee. I used to love making friendship bracelets! Their post triggered an onslaught of summery memories for me: lazy afternoons in the crafts cabin at summer camp, DIY bubblegum-colored pedicures to show off in my flip-flops, and gooey s'mores and late night ghost stories under the stars.


Though these once epitomized the fierceness of my adolescent relationships, I love how they look on my adult self too--kind of bohemian and casual, perfect for wearing to the lake. How come I never thought of these fun stash-busters before?

What kinds of yarn work best for these fun macrame projects? Cotton is the perfect choice, though other cellulose fibers would work fine too. Cellulose fibers are those that are derived from plants (as opposed to protein fibers which come from animals). Do you have any scraps of these yarns laying around? All you need is 72 inches!

• Premiere 50% pima cotton, 50% tencel
• Cotton Bam Boo 52% cotton, 48% bamboo viscose
• Provence 100% mercerized Egyptian cotton
• Solstice 70% organic cotton, 30% merino wool

Head over to our Facebook page and show us what you came up with!

What's on our Needles?

As you can imagine, we're always knitting around the office here at Classic Elite. After our usual lunch around the conference table, you can always find someone knitting away on a new project, whether its a top secret sample from next season, or a new independent design (we're lucky to have some fabulous in-house designers...) But most of the time, we're making the things lined up in our Ravelry queues. I thought you might want to see how we're using Classic Elite yarns.

Susan, our creative director, completed an adapted Annis in Firefly to wear to TNNA.

Meg, our graphic designer, just finished up a Starry Night Stripes blanket in Liberty Print to brighten up her living room. This pattern is her own design, and is one of our Liberty Print Subscription patterns, free to subscribing LYS's.

Tonia, you remember her from her designer interview a few weeks ago, is knitting up Parkhurst, also one of her own designs. I love Silky Alpaca Lace!

Allegoro Staff Projects!

Our webletter this week gives you a little sneak peek into our homes and lives with some original designs by Classic Elite staffers! It was interesting to talk to everyone about what inspired their designs. Andi's beautiful napkin edging is a tribute to her grandmother and a harkening to a more genteel time, when tables were set with true linens and many women created beautiful things for their homes by hand.

The elegance of Tonia's napkin belies its origin: fun! At her home, summer meals are enjoyed al fresco in her beach-inspired screened porch, I love her family motto, printed eloquently on the sign below. The napkin would also be perfect for picnics, where it's key to minimize waste and your environmental impact on our city's green spaces.

Susan's lovely faux-mitered table squares add the perfect accent to a summer table, as photographed under a mason jar filled with flowers from the garden.

Lastly, Meg, who had a little uninvited guest at her home, got hooked on antiseptic wipes and felt a giant plastic canister didn't quite complement her decor. Thus, a not-always-pleasant reality of urban living was her inspiration.

Looking at all these lovely home projects got me thinking about how to adapt them to garments...