vionnet

The Vital Statistics
Pattern: A rectangular stole knit on the bias in garter stitch with a row of eyelets every now and then; that is, I made it up.
Yarn: My obsession with Noro Yuzen (56 percent wool, 34 per cent silk, 10 per cent mohair) in shade 3 continues into its seventeenth ball; this took about 8.7 skeins judging by its weight (435 grams or about a pound).
Needles: 4.5mm.
Start to finish: 1 May to 1 June 2011; I took a few days break to knit Nessie.
Stash/recycle content: Nope.

Comments: Hmm. Hmm-mm. I love this yarn. I love this colourway. I love it in garter stitch. But I don't love this stole. I think that I have said before that designing something is really difficult (I'm sure that many have said that before, and long before me). How to achieve that perfect marriage between shape, yarn, texture, drape, all of those essential elements that just make something work.

I wanted something really big with this yarn in order to see lots of it but this big is too big, too heavy, unwieldy. I wanted it in garter stitch and did it on the bias to make it a bit more interesting but the stripes are too narrow for my liking. (They're a bit wider in one section because I had one ball from a different dyelot that I spliced in colour by colour.) I also managed to run out of yarn (despite having weighed the work after finishing the set-up section) and as a result had to cast off a good few rows before finishing the final corner.

Verdict: Hmm, not sure. I don't think that this works in its current form. Do I want to rip it out and use the yarn for something else? I do actually have an idea for something to do with some self-striping yarn but it has all been spit spliced together and with that whole other ball spliced in ... really not sure. Perhaps I'll just wear it around the house for a bit, although it's warming up here now so that might not be anytime soon. Hmm, it has a reprieve for now.