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I love spending time with other knitters. Someone who gets it when you say, “three fives, two fours and end with three fives”. I had a great knit-date with Kate Gilbert, creative director of Twist Collective and designer extraordinaire.  We walked from her new apartment through changeable weather, hot and sunny, a quick downpour, a chill wind,  all in the space of our 20 minute walk through her pretty Montreal neighborhood, leading us to our trés-yum  chocolate shop destination.

Over a steaming bowl of hot chocolate and a fleur de sel brownie…we snickered at simple math that stumped us both…muttered comments like “60 is a good number isn’t it?” and “what’s wrong with purling?” She told  funny stories including one of a recent bruising hail storm she was caught in while biking her 3 year old home from school, a little alarming but her vivid description made me gasp and laugh. We swapped “how I learned to knit” stories. Kate, also self taught knitter, has an unusual style, holding her needles under her right arm, which looks vaguely Shetland-like without the needle belt. She developed this technique while she learned from a book, and found she could turn the pages without letting go of her needles. Very fast she is, silver needles flying!

You can catch a glimpse of her current project above, through the glass dimly…just a tease however…which matches the drizzle of chocolate and caramel of our brownie.

Back at Kate’s apartment I met husband Fred and their daughter- a little ray of sunshine- who is nearly four. Though my daughter used to babysit her I’d only caught a glimpse of the wee one before. Charmed! She showed me many things she was thinking of juggling, called me “Monster Mary Jane” which I took as a compliment and showed off all the great features of her new bedroom including her cool sitting area with its little table and a future tent area. I also got a look at Kate’s enviable new studio, she’s graduated from the couch: she can shut the door, there’s dress form with space around it, tree-top tall shelves and a spacious desk in front of a big beautiful window, yippee!

Thanks Kate, for taking time out of your busy life for such a fun rendezvous.

I got a couple of emails asking me to share my Instructor Questionnaire from Fiber College …so here goes!

Teaching takes courage and experience…and so much extra time.  When you’re not teaching, what else do you like to do?

I’m big on daydreaming, I constantly think about the next design, sketching ideas on whatever is at hand. I love looking at books, some knitting books, but an awful lot of historic textile books, architecture books, books about different cultures, and strange and unusual books I happen upon. No matter what I’m reading, I always look to see what people are wearing, how they are wearing it and the colors and patterns of the garments. I look at the backgrounds of images a lot, what do the people in the picture have in their house? Watching movies I’m always studying the background too, and I’m often rewarded with some interesting textile, or great color combination.

Where do you find inspiration, what is an important aspect of your work?

I find inspiration everywhere I turn, the pale yellow, palest pink and juicy pink of my morning grapefruit, a thrifted potholder with crocheted violets, the makers stamp on the bottom of a dish.

I think attention to detail is important in my work, choosing the right beginning…garter stitch? ribbing? corrugated ribbing? For me the process of making something is as important as the finished product, being mindful of the moment, taking time to be present…a challenge with a lot of my work which involves impossible deadlines!

Describe the perfect class that you’d like to take…

I like a leisurely class with a lot of student interaction. I like to know about the teacher, what makes them tick where they get their inspiration, and I also want to get a feel for my classmates. I love to learn new techniques and find even if I think I ‘know it all’ I always get something from a class. To tell the truth, I’m kind of a class junkie, I love taking classes, I’m planning to take at least two here at Fiber College.

We’d like a sense of your expertise and ability to teach the class you’re offering…so tell us how you came to feel confident about leading a group through your particular class.  How long have you been practicing?

Hmmm lets see. I was the handwork teacher for the local Waldorf school , I taught first second and third graders knitting and crochet, so I am verrry patient and very aware of individual learning styles. I’m always looking for the key to unlock understanding for a student. I also worked at a yarn shop for many years fielding every manner of knitting emergency and encountering a wild array of “knitter personalities”.

I’ve got a strong background in color and fashion, earning a BFA in Printmaking from Pratt Institute , taking fashion courses at Parson’s School of Design, studying Textiles and Historic Costume at the University of Washington.
I was the photostylist for Interweave Knits Magazine for a couple of years, a great job which gave me personal access to the work of many, many talented hand knitting designers. This job required a very careful inspection of every garment so that we could show them off to their best advantage and also include all the subtle “knitterly” details.

I’ve been knitting stranded colorwork for about 20 years now. I started with top down sweaters for my kids and their cousins when they were babies, mostly out of worsted weight…crazy mixed up sweaters, no two ever alike. I also made a lot of mittens, the kids were always losing them (no pie!) and hats.

I always dreamed of tackling traditional fair isle knitting, being especially inspired by Alice Starmore and also the work of Patricia Johnston, mother of  fellow fiber college teacher Gudrun Johnston, who had a company called The Shetland Trader. I loved both these women’s take on the traditional, and I really wanted to try it myself, but I just didn’t have the courage. One day while reading Sheila McGregor’s book The Complete Book of Traditional Fair Isle Knitting, she wrote “ why not start with a hat”? I thought…sensible idea…I put down the book and off I went, knitting away, mixing colors as I went. That’s where the idea for my Stranded Colorwork Sampler Hat class really originated, the beauty of a sampler, meant for practice.

If you make a knitting error  do you jump right in and frog it (rip it out) or do you call it a design feature and keep right on going?  Does the mistake cause you anxiety or do you feel like it’s just one more opportunity to make the project your own?

I go both ways on mistakes, really depending on my mood and who the item is for. I have had major miscalculations become the best part of a design, pushing me beyond my original expectations, but I’m also not afraid to rip out hours of work, in fact I kind of find it liberating!

What techniques are in your bag of tricks for motivating a student to struggle through a difficult step…maybe something that’s just a bit out of his/her range…and come out the other side feeling successful?

As far as “tricks” go, I think the single most important thing is to look at your work. Really look at the work in your hands and see what you are doing.  It sounds almost too simple, but there you go, try it!

Read the directions through before you ever begin. Highlight areas that seem confusing. Chances are when you get to the “scary part” in the actual pattern, it will by that time make sense. Reading through will also alert you to things you might overlook if you’re really going gang-busters on a project and start making assumptions….there might be some instructions you haven’t anticipated.

Keep calm, focus on what you like about the project, you will be able to do what seems to be impossible.

If you still find you are having trouble. let it rest. go back to it when you are relaxed and if it is still no go…take it to your LYS for help.

If you could ask your students questions and class time wasn’t an issue, what sort of things would you like to know about the people sitting in front of you?

I’m very curious about my students, which is one reason why I like a longer class time. I really want to know all about everyone, where they live, what they like to do, what they like to make, what they like to eat, if they like to travel, if they’ve been to any good museums lately, if they hoola hoop. I think student participation and interaction are important elements in the classroom.

I am an avid collector of:

I collect…..Yarn! and vintage mugs, I always need new ones since they’re always breaking.

The best advice I have ever been given:

Choose a group of light colors and a group of dark colors.

What is your favorite color? List three qualities of the color. Consider that these qualities apply to your work.

Green is my favorite color, I don’t know, maybe since I grew up in Seattle and it is always green there. I find it energizing but at the same time calming. But to be honest, I like just about every color, you know, you put a color you think you hate next to another color and all of a sudden the ugly one becomes your new favorite.

What is your formal educational background and what do you differently from the way you were taught.

With knitting I’m self taught, actually I was shown the basics a couple of times, but I crossed over to Continental on my own, after my friend returned from Sweden, and I thought it looked so much cooler. It is cooler, and much more efficient, but I’m comfortable teaching both styles.

What do you like best about what you do?

Making things up, mixing new colors, the unexpected “wow” that comes from a happy accident.

Ta-da!

My Stranded Colorwork Hat class is Saturday September 12th, 9-1 More Details

Read the other Fiber College Instructor interviews HERE and sign up for classes by Gudrun Johnston, Jackie Fee and others HERE.

At long last! While on a jaunt to a nearby island with my daughter and her friends, I enjoyed a little knitting time. Not much, but enough to see how my natural grey Shetland wool is just exactly the color of an oyster shell. We were delighted to be provided with oysters to eat raw or roasted in the fire, I let someone else do the opening …to avoid this!