Fostering Your Creative Spirit

In 1971 a textile artist named Mary Walker Phillips published a book that rocked both the knitting world AND the art world.

Creative Knitting challenged the commonly held notion that knitting was a purely utilitarian activity.

Miss Phillips wanted to push the boundaries of what knitting could do.

She knit using unusual materials like paper, leather, and hair.

She pioneered freeform knitting, combining stitches at random to create one of a kind fabrics.

She knit with larger than normal needles to emphasize the negative space BETWEEN the stitches.

And examples of her knitted wall hangings have been exhibited in more than 200 art museums around the world.

But this article isn’t about Miss Phillips impact on knitting. We’ll talk about that another time.

No, this article is about you {{ subscriber.first_name | strip | default: fellow knitter }}.

What Is A Creative Knitter?

A lot of people think that being *creative* is synonymous with being artistic.

I’d even push back on the idea that knitted *art* has to lack structure or any utilitarian value. Just take a look at what Kaffe Fasset, Stephen West, or Olga Buraya-Kefelian do with yarn.

It’s important that some people use their creativity to push the envelope and expand the boundaries of what can be considered art.

However, just the act of knitting is creative in and of itself. You are literally CREATING something out of nothing when you make a hat, or shawl, or pair of socks.

Redefining Creativity

You may not think you are a very creative person because you don’t design patterns.

But you would be wrong.

When we talk about creativity at The Yarnist we mean it in the truest sense of the word; that you take an idea, apply it to your work, and make something new.

Creativity can be as simple as deciding to hold some mohair lace with your main yarn to give a project a halo.

It can be adding some beads to a lace pattern.

Or it can be using a different bind off than what the pattern suggested because you like the way it looks better.

So how do we foster that creativity through what we do here at The Yarnist?

Fostering Your Creativity as a Fearless Knitter

As I mentioned over the past couple days our goal is to help you become a more Fearless Knitter; someone who is curious, creative, and contributes through their knitting.

We spark curiosity through our daily newsletter, which explores the culture of yarn craft in all it’s forms.

But we foster creativity in three ways:

1. Tutorials and Classes
   Our 1,000+ stitch videos and 50+ knitting classes are resources meant to inspire you to create. By seeing new stitch patterns, or breaking down a topic like cables, you will be equipped with techniques and skills to try something different.

2. LIVE Online Workshops
   In the past year we’ve hosted more than 13 LIVE knitting workshops. We distill all of the best info around a topic into a 60-90 minute training. Not only do these events give you an opportunity to practice new skills, you get real-time feedback if you run into trouble. And starting in September we’ll be hosting multiple workshops every month!

3. Knit-A-Longs
   Learning is great, but you haven’t really learned until you’ve put it into practice. Our workshops are the first step, but our KALs challenge you to knit something you’ve never tried before. And we actively encourage our participants to use their creativity to adapt and change the project to suit them.

You see, I don’t want to tell you about all the cool things you can knit.

I want to give you a reason to try them out.

Even if you don’t participate in one of our events, I hope that you get inspired to express your creativity through your knitting every day!

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I’m currently offering a HUGE discount to upgrade to LIFETIME access as a Golden Fleece member.

But that discount disappears at Midnight (Pacific), Friday August 4th.

You’ll still be able to upgrade for one more week after that (or we hit our 100 person cap) but it will be at full price.

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Dash Stitch

So this is a pretty simple stitch.

But simple doesn’t have to mean boring (as you’ll see in today’s pattern pick).

With a little imagination you can take some purl ridges and make something beautiful out of them.