53822 The Knitters Bible7

INTARSIA

Intarsia is a technique of colour knitting suitable for large arcas of colour where several blocks of diffcrcnt colours arc worked in the same row. Unlike fair isle knitting where two colours are carried along the row to form a repeating pattem, intarsia knitting is characterized by single motifs, geometrie patterns or pictures.

Intarsia uses a separate bali of yarn for each błock of colour. The yarns are twisted together to link the areas of colour and prevent a hole. Most colourwork designs are worked in stockinette (stocking) stitch and it is only suitable for fiat knitting: in circular knitting the yarns will always be at the end of the colour błock and must be cut off and rejoined at the beginning. Intarsia patterns are worked front charts and often the whole garment will be charted (see page 37).

Bobbins

Each area of colour needs its own bobbin of yam.You should never knit straight from the bali because with all the twisting, the yam will become horribly tangled and the knitting becomes a chore. Workjng with bobbins you can puli out sufficient yam to knit the stitches and then leave it hanging at the back of the work out of the way of the other yarns.

Joining in a new colour

You can buy plastic bobbins and wrap a smali amount of yarn on to each one but it is easy to make your own and cheaper if the intarsia design requires a lot of separate areas of colour. Leaving a long end. wind the yam in a figurę of eight around your thumb and little finger. Cut the yam and use this cut end to tie a knot around the middle of the bobbin. Use the long end to puli the yam from the middle of the bobbin. If the knotted end becomes loose around the bobbin as you puli yam out. keep tightening it otherwise the bobbin will unravel.

Ran your knitting before you start Work out how many bobbins of each colour you will need. If there are only a smali number of stitches to be worked. cut a sufficient length of yam. there is no need to wind it into a bobbin. Allow three times the width of stitches for the yam needed to work those stitches.

1 Insert the tip of the right-hand needle into the next stitch. place the cut end (4in/IOcm from the end) of the new colour over the old colour and over the tip of the right-hand needle.

2 Take the working end of the new colour and knit the next stitch. pulling ♦ the cut end off the needle over the workmg end as the stitch is formed so it is not knitted in. Hołd the cut end down against the back of the work.

To continue...

The old and new colours will be twisted together, preventing a hole and you can carry on using the new colour. Leave the cut end dangling to be sewn in later or continue weaving it in (see page 49).

On a purl row. join in a new colour in the same way. twisting the yarns together on the wrong side of the work.