Emily's Emily Capelet!

One of our customers came in wearing the most beautiful Emily capelet from Ysolda Teague's new book, Whimsical Little Knits 2, and I was inspired to make one of my own. It was shortly before Spring Festival (also know as Lunar New Year or Chinese New Year) and it is tradition to wear new red clothing. Well, I am a Tiger and this is the year of the Tiger, and after finally getting over my six year aversion to red I thought I should celebrate by knitting myself a red capelet for a present! After all, the name of the pattern is Emily, how perfect is that?


I have been a aficionado of Ysolda Teague ever since making her Urchin pattern (available free on Knitty). Her designs are always surprising in their clever construction and are an homage to the craft of knitting. This exciting project contains so many techniques--including short rows, cables, I-cord border, lace knitting and knitted lace--but is fairly simple and thus an excellent introduction to these concepts.


I love it! It is so perfect and beautiful and special. I used two skeins of Cascade Pure Alpaca in the loveliest shade of Ruby. (knerd digression) The only thing I changed was the way the wrapped short row stitches were treated... I used Cat Bordhi's method of picking up and knitting the wraps from her book New Pathways for Sock Knitters: Book One (/knerd digression). We have the pattern for the Emily both in the Whimsical Little Knits 2 and as a single pattern.