Wednesday 26 January 2011

colour by numbers

I love the Babette blanket from Interweave Crochet back in Spring of 2006 and I would love to make one. While I'm quite happy to crochet a hundred-odd squares, I'm not prepared to purchase the requisite 17 skeins of Koigu Premium Merino. So, the colour scheme - if you are going to substitute, what to do about the colour scheme?

This is where my cerebral tendencies kick in and I completely overthink the entire thing. First of all, I had to get an idea of what the entire blanket actually looks like, so I printed out the schema, enlarged it and coloured it in (added bonus here of acquiring 15 new markers).

Which is all very well and has left me with a pretty piece of paper (and a great marker selection) but more uncertain than ever. I'm dilemma-ing about what ratio there is of one colour to another; how often are certain colours adjacent to each other and on what scale; how did the designer come up with this colour scheme, randomly or according to some great underlying organising principle; and what was it? Trying to work that last one out may well be the end of me. It is probably also completely pointless because in the end I think that the colour thing really is just intuitive (which irks me no end in its own way).

Anyway, there are dozens of wonderful Babette projects on Ravelry, quite a few of which I like better than the original, particularly one that is Gustav Klimt inspired, all yellow and gold and ochre. While they are not my colours, I could maybe see using something by Hundertwasser as inspiration.

ps. My FedEx package has left Orlando, Florida and the next scheduled tracking update won't be until Thursday. Perhaps it's on a train? Where will it end up? Stay tuned!

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi Amelia. Fellow Melbournian, long-time lurker, first-time commenter. Really enjoy your blog. Thought you might be interested in this link to a random colour/stripe generator that a clever knitter came up with: http://www.kissyourshadow.com/stripe_maker.php. I had great fun with it once upon a time and I found it helped with the colour/mix selection. Good luck, Chris

Kay said...

Hi Amelia, Heather gave me the link to your blog. What amazing projects you have posted. I have enjoyed reading about them. I think the best way to approach your color dillema is random. Follow a basic "plan" but edit as you go. That pattern would make a stunning quilt!! Just saying :)cheers..Kay

nikkishell said...

Hello m'dear! I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with for this quilt, whatever you do it will be fabulous.
Hope you and the family are well.
big hugs.xx

shandy said...

Some people seem to be able to pick random colours that just sing , while others would just get a mess. See Attic 24 for someone with brilliant colour sense.