The first leaves are starting to turn, there’s a crispness in the air, the kids are heading back to school … all signs point to autumn’s arrival! With the start of a new season, it’s also time to embark on our September Boost Your Knitting project … the aptly named Flying Leaves Scarf! This beautiful, reversible scarf designed by Carol Feller will not only keep you cosy as temperatures drop, it’ll teach us the finer points of working two-colour brioche!
Image © Jesse Wild
To say brioche has had something of a moment in the knitting world is a massive understatement. Despite its ever growing popularity though, it’s a technique that even many confident knitters are wary of approaching; it’s definitely the technique we’re most often asked to cover! With different stitch names than more familiar knitting techniques and knitted fabric that’s less intuitive to “read,” it’s no wonder that many feel a bit at sea when contemplating a brioche project. But, as you might recall, we made a start building up our brioche skill-set back in March, learning the basic tuck stitches that create brioche! This month, we’ll combine those stitches and learn how to work increases and decreases to make squishy, two-coloured, fully reversible knitted fabrics with confidence! As always, they’ll be photo and video tutorials, handy tips, and loads of support in our Ravelry group to help you on your brioche journey!
Carol Feller’s pattern for this month is the Flying Leaves Scarf, a delectable two-colour brioche number that’s knit side to side, meaning you’ll be working longer rows (giving you plenty of time to get into a rhythm with your new skills) but far fewer than you’d typically work for a scarf. The pattern begins with a two-colour Italian cast on, but you can also opt to use the two-colour long-tail cast-on method we used for March’s Bramen Cowl. To create the beautiful two-colour brioche, each row is worked twice – once in each colour. The finished product, I think you’ll agree, is just the thing for wrapping up in on a crisp autumn day.
Image © Jesse Wild
Flying Leaves is knit in Carol Feller’s own yarn, Nua, a sportweight blend of merino, yak, and linen. The various fibres take the dye differently, resulting in beautiful heathered tones that have a real depth to them. We have ten shades in the online shop for you to mix and match – you’ll need just two skeins of each of two colours! We are so pleased to be stocking this new-to-us yarn, and I can’t wait to see the colour combinations people come up with this month.
As always, of course, you’re welcome to join in this month’s Boost Your Knitting KAL with any project that uses this month’s featured technique, brioche! So whether you can’t wait to cast on Carol’s scarf or you want to use this as an opportunity to tackle that brioche behemoth you’ve had in your queue for ages (I’m certainly hoping to make a bit more progress on my Briochevron Wrap as well as working on Flying Leaves!), do join us over in the Ravelry group for chat and support. To be in with a chance of winning one of our monthly prizes, all you need to do is post an in-progress photo of your object in the KAL thread and make sure your Ravelry project is tagged with “BoostYourKnitting”!
Image © Jesse Wild
And if you’ve been waiting to join Boost Your Knitting, the print book is now in stock and ready to ship! It costs £22 plus shipping and includes a complimentary eBook download.