Wednesday 13 April 2016

The Norwegian Blue jumper

I have finally finished the 1940s Bestway Lovebirds jumper I wrote about in my last post. 







I am quite delighted with it. I love these wild colour contrasts. The original design is for a green jumper with some birds in red, red being the colour of a Lovebird. Mine are in blue as that is what my stash dictated (I wasn't going to go and buy new yarn just incase it all went wrong) so this is now the Norwegian Blue jumper (as in the Dead Parrot sketch). 




Electric blue is definitely one of my fave colours. I have a faux-vintage swing coat in this colour which has been my everyday winter coat for the past year or two. I won't be run over in this colour combination that's for sure. The orange also goes with my vintage earrings and bangles.

I can say completing this has been a bit of a miracle, depending as it did on leaping in and learning how to do colour work from scratch. Halfway through the birds I had to unpick about 10 rows, luckily by that point I had got used working with multiple colours and it didn't take long to redo it. All the birds have their own colour strands, which means by the end there are hundreds of ends, which didn't get too tangled thankfully. I think if I do it again I will tie off some of the ends as I go. Other than shortening the waistband a bit, and also taking 4 rows from the length I didn't change anything. 

If anyone wants to try this I would say go for it. It's not that hard if you are used to intarsia and if you are not then it's a very good way to learn. More details on my Ravelry if you want them.



7 comments:

  1. I love this jumper - I am sure you will wear it lots!

    Did you ever finish the trousers you were planning to make last year?

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    1. Thank you. I kind of did, I managed to produce some shorts and they were really comfy. I think I will go back to that and make some pedal pushers to go with a top I already made. I think stretch fabric is a definite bonus with trousers!

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  2. I am in total awe of your knitting skills, what a stunning jumper and the colours are perfect.

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    1. Thank you very much. I don't think I've got the bug now, I have found some really nice vintage patterns which is always inspiring.

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  3. Replies
    1. Thank you very much, it was worth the effort for sure.

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