Award-winning Scottish publishing and design
Hello! We have a busy week ahead here at KDD – and the whole team is still hard at work preparing everything behind the scenes for three almost-simultaneous big launches: our People MAKE Glasgow book; our beautiful new Schiehallion yarn, and our new club. I’ll tell you all about Schiehallion later in the week, but…
Read More
We’ve a new pattern release today: Horology! This is a cardigan I designed as part of a collaboration with my friends at Laxtons, who are about to release some wonderful new yarns for hand-knitters. I’ll explain a bit. Laxtons are a Yorkshire yarn manufacturer who develop and spin many wonderful yarns, with many different purposes.…
Read More
There is a lot going on here behind the scenes (I’ve been writing a book and designing a new collection with our brand new yarn) and I’ve not found myself with much spare time for blog posting . . . but in amongst all the hard work I’ve been enjoying some nice things, such as…
Read More
note: links in this post refer back to Ravelry projects and profiles. Perhaps because I worked for so long in universities, September has always had a fresh start-of-a-new-year feel about it to me, and I suspect that might also be the case for anyone who works with (or just enjoys) yarn and knitting. Here at…
Read More
Hello! Friday is project reveal day, and today I wanted to show you a new iteration of one of my favourite designs of 2019 – the Udal pullover, designed for and with Meg Rodger’s Birlinn Yarn Company. Inspired by one of my favourite Hebridean places, and using Meg’s own fabulously hardy and beautiful Hebridean wool…
Read More
Good morning and happy Friday everyone! Today we are feeling particularly pleased because Ardnamurchan is back in stock! And with stock of this lovely tealy-green shade available, we can now release this new summery design of which I’m really very fond – Treit. Treit is a simple tee with a lace yoke, knitted from the…
Read More
A shawl for midsummer! A shawl red as a June strawberry, light as an evening breeze! The name of the pattern is Beamer Now, in many parts of Scotland, Beamer is not a particular brand of car, but a word for blushing. To “take a beamer” means to blush – most usually with embarassment –…
Read More
There are things involved with developing and writing a knitting pattern which you rarely get to see. This is one of those things. Yorlin is knitted top down. This means you can work your cardigan to exactly the length that you’d like, so that it suits your body. The design features two lace panels, using…
Read More
Hello! After some welcome warm weather, there’s been an unusually cold snap over the past few days in Scotland. Though we’ve not seen much of the snow and hail flurries that have been bothering friends further north, the air has turned very cold, we’ve put off planting out our broccoli, and have had to protect…
Read More
I sometimes feel that I’m unusual in my love of ends. As a project draws to completion, and especially if it has involved a lot of different shades, I really look forward to sorting all the ends out. I don’t find this process onerous. It’s just a question of setting aside enough time and being…
Read More
Good morning! Friday is project reveal day – or in this case, outfit reveal day. Do you remember St Catherines – the shrug-style garter-stitch cardigan that’s included in my Shore collection? I originally designed this piece in a solid colour, which I wore, and rather liked, but then Mel knit up a bruce and birkin…
Read More
One of my favourite things about designing is that, after completing my work on a pattern, I get to see it afresh through the eyes of other knitters who gravitate to different colourways. I love these changes in perspective and often I see a design quite differently when a creative knitter simply reverses the shade…
Read More
Hello! Friday is project reveal day, and up today is a light and simple knit I’m really enjoying wearing at the moment – The Observatory. I originally created this design for our West Highland Way book, building the pattern around one of my all-time favourite Shetland lace edgings. This edging has a wonderful, intuitive rhythm,…
Read More
Good morning, and happy Friday, everyone. Thanks so much for your comments on yesterday’s post. I’d especially like to thank Vivienne Richmond, who kindly shared the booklet that accompanies the exhibition she curated about the darning and needlework collections of Whitelands College. Like many samplers, those in Vivienne’s exhibition originate in the classroom – eighteenth-…
Read More
Good morning! Something new to show to you today – our latest shade of Milarrochy Tweed. Dyed to a beautifully saturated hue of blue-y green, this shade is enlivened by tweedy twists and flecks of pale pink and paler green. It’s a deep, bold colour – almost the opposite of the spectrum from our other…
Read More
Good morning! Time for another pattern release today! I love our new Asphodel shade of Milarrochy Tweed – a light, fresh orange colour with bold tweedy neps. I wanted to really celebrate Apphodel’s interest and complexity by featuring it in a garment – so I designed Con Alma A couple of years ago, I designed…
Read More