I’ve been rather busy this week, so busy it wasn’t until attempting to post this week’s free pattern I noticed my site was down. Well, not ‘down’; I share server space with Mr. Angry Jim and due to some hierarchy glitch his site kept popping up whenever folks attempted to visit mine. Some kind person on Ravelry sent me a note about it, indicating the issue’d been going on since at least Thursday (and due to silliness on my part I accidentally deleted the message; do write back please!).
All is well now, and I certainly hope those who were redirected to Angry Jim’s site poked around a bit and enjoyed themselves. Also thank you to Site5, the server host who I will now plug after answering my frantic questions, LIVE, at 2 AM like it was perfectly normal. I probably interrupted someone’s Warcraft raid but they jumped right on fixing the problem.
I’ve often wondered if it’s not fear of technical difficulties that keeps many people from knitting vintage. The idea of looking at a pattern that assumes you have proficiency in intermediate knitting skills or will adventurously plunge into the unknown and potentially incomplete could make many a novice knitter nervous. Man, the alliteration’s been out of control this week.
There’s also the ‘trade-off’ of time invested in a garment vs. the satisfaction of completion. Most vintage patterns with their wee gauges and fiddly attention to detail scare away all but knitters who love the process and history nerds (a fine Venn overlap in my opinion). It’s true that finer gauge is part of the ‘vintage look’ of many knits; these garments were intended to be worn until the wearer outgrew them and the initial time creating them reflected the long-term investment in usage. However, the past has always had room for frippery and fad, from the ultra-balloon sleeves of the Regency period to the Hammer pants of the 90s and….uh, today apparently.
So it makes sense there were beginner, quick-knit, and chunky patterns of every era. In an attempt to get everyone to knit more old-timey goodness I’ve posted chunky knits from the 20s (2-Hour Sweater), 30s (3-Hour Sweater), and now the 40s (one guess how long this one will take).
(Pattern given for the one on the left.)
Stop….pattern time.
