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A Chan cc Mcc ling

What happens w hen you take a luxury fil>er that's not sup-poscd to felt, knit something lovely, then throw ii in llic wash-mg machinę and felt it anyway? What could be an u n fortuna te knitting accident instcad beeomes a wonderful opcning kito a n ew and dynamie fi ber expression. Sucłi was my introduction lo shibori.

Włien my daughter rcceived an opportunity to sludy puppet making in the Czech Republic, I whipped up a fast pair oi hand warmers. She would bc speriding many hours doiły carving wood in a snow-covered barn oulside Prague, and from my perspective, warm bul nimbie hands seemed a prercquisite for this crcative task. From stash yarns, I pulied a T)K weight silk/inerino blend, and for fun, added a euff embellishment using two differenl silk yarns—one boncie, the olhcr a smooth single ply. Weeks after her return from Eastern Europę, when my daughter finally emplied her backpark, one of the hand warm-ers inadvertently madę its way inlo llie washable pile of clolhcs. Pulling one wet hond war mer out of the washer, I braeed myself for knit disaster—until 1 saw whal liud happened. The silk/ merino blend fclled beautifully, and now had an exquisite halo willi an ethereal te\ture and shccn. The euff, madę from Iwo kinds of silk fiber, didnT felt—it ruffled. Dclighted, I called out lo my daughter, "Where's your otłier hand warmer? Lcfs fclt it!''

Felted shibori knitting is a spectacular collision oi chancc and happy accidcnl, where the precision of knitting meets the magie of shaped-resist felting.

The happy accident that created these hand warmers (page 88), above, openeri the door to my personaI shibori exploration. Spirals and rnffles are two of the wonderful textures possible with shibori, as seen in the Fortrail Scarf (page 110), at riglit.

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