more nålbinding photos

[kareina]

I finally got the camera and the hats I've made via nålbinding in one place. Thanks to clovis_t, who braved nasty allergy-causing pollens to accompany me to a park, where he took photos of me wearing the hats.

Project completed May 2010: peaked hat with neck ruff
Materials: blue merino wool (very soft)
Technique: nålbinding, Finnish stitch

This one was worked by first stitching a band long enough to go around my head, then spiraling up from there till it was mostly tall enough, then decreasing the number of stitches each round till the spiral met in the middle. Then I added the neck ruff by working back and forth along the bottom (simply turning the hat around to change directions). When I was nearly out of thread I finished the face-opening by switching to a single loop around the thumb (normal Finnish stitch has three loops) to make a narrow bead around the edge to smooth out the places where I'd changed directions.

Much to my surprise this changed from a rounded-top cap which just barely covered my head to a long peaked cap when I washed it in hot soapy water. I half expected it to felt and shrink a bit, but instead the stitch stretched and relaxed, giving me the cute peak and extending the ruff, which had just reached mid-neck, long enough to fasten it under my chin (I'll stitch on a fastening loop and bead later--for this photo it is held on with my wooden nålbinding needle):




Project completed March 2010: black and white thick hat
Technique: nålbinding, Finnish stitch
Materials: heavy, loosely spun wool yarn

This was my first attempt at a project using the Finnish stitch (unless you count a tiny test piece when I learned it at the textile forum last August). I started this one by working a band of white, large enough to go around my head, then spiraled it till I ran out of yarn. By then I'd purchased a similar weight black yarn (while visiting Stockholm), so I switched colours and continued some number of rows. Then I set it aside and worked a spiral from the center out with the black yarn (to see if I could). When it was large enough I attached it to the hat-band in progress, and finished it by adding another bunch of rows along the bottom in black.

When washed the densely packed stitched became even more densely packed. To keep it from shrinking too much I dried it over a large SCA soup bowl. When not needed as a hat (which would require a very cold day, given how thick this is) this project doubles as a felt protector for said bowl. The stitch detail:



and the full hat:




My first hat, project completed late 2009
Materials: blue/purple/aqua wool hand-spun for me by my friend taligalicia (who is truly wonderful)
Technique: basic, beginner nålbinding stitch I learned from a random web page I failed to bookmark.

This was worked starting at the crown and spiraling out from there, till it eventually started getting a bit tight, so I added more extra stitches, which resulted in the ruffle. After the hat was big enough to put onto my head I switched back to not adding extra stitches to make a bottom band. I wasn't certain about the ruffles at first, but they happen to fit exactly over my hearing aids, making the hat far more comfortable than it would have been without that extra space.




There are more photos of the hats (some with me wearing them, one showing the peaked hat at full stretch) available over in Facebook).

Comments

[gurdymonkey.livejournal.com]

It has a rather Dr. Seuss quality - and I love the color.

[taligalicia.livejournal.com]

So thats what happened to that wool! I'm glad to see it went into a good cause! nifty hats!

[kareina.livejournal.com]

Yup! There is *one* mitten from it, too. My very first attempt at doing a hat spiraling from the center didn't include adding extra stitches (since I'd never made 3-D objects from string before, only weaving, sewing and embroidery, I didn't know I needed to). As a result it became very conical, and while it could have, in the fullness of time, grown long enough to become one of those hats where the point hangs fully down the back, I knew that I wasn't willing to do that many stitches, nor did I have enough yarn.

So I set the failed attempt aside, using it as a bag in which to store the wool to be added. When I finished that hat there was still some yarn left, and I decided that I may as well try to turn it into a mitten, since it fit the ends of my fingers nicely. I'd managed to get it far enough along to have a thumb and just cover the back of the hand, but not the wrist, when I went to the Textile Forum last August, and learned the Finnish Stitch (from a woman from Finland, no less). Since that was the only yarn I had on me, I used it to learn the new stitch, attaching a cuff of Finnish stitch to the mitten.

There is quite a contrast between the textures of the two stitches, and the Finnish stitch is *much* faster, since each knot goes over so many additional threads, so takes up more volume per stitch. (Which makes it much thicker and warmer, too). Once I finished that mitten I started a second cuff in Finnish stitch, so as to be certain I could remember how to start a project whilst my teacher was still available, but ran out of yarn about the time the second cuff was complete. So if I ever want to finish the second mitten, I'll have to find another yarn which looks nice with this one.

Thanks so much for the yarn! It has been fun to play with. Now I just need to decide what to do with the lovely burgundy stuff you also gave me. Probably not till I finish the socks in progress, though. I think that yarn may want to become something tablet-woven...