“Christmas is very nearly here” — where did the year go? As always, Stitchcraft‘s December issue is a mix of warm, bulky, quick-to-knit winter garments for the family and little handcrafts for presents and decorations.
Our cover model is wearing a hat in trendy “high-crowned” style with matching muffler. It uses “Glenora”, Patons new tweedy-multicolour wool. Unlike the “tufted” hat from last month’s issue, this one needs no millinery wire to keep it from flopping — the wool is relatively thick and is used double on the hat to make it really solid and windproof. The buttons are purely decorative and are made by covering button moulds with velvet cut from a strip of ribbon.
Other cold-weather accessories include these mitt(en)s, crocheted in a spiral to make the backs and fronts. Aside from the stripes on the fronts, they are almost identical to these mittens from February 1960. The full-size garments are all made of bulky wools for wamth and quicker knitting. There are pullovers for men and women in Big Ben or Ariel wools, a check-patterned pullover in double knitting weight and a cardigan “in larger sizes” (39-42 inch bust). Both of the bulky pullovers as well as the cardigan use variations on twisted or mock-cable stitch patterns, where you knit stitches in the “wrong order” in order to cross them. Big, pointy collars are still very much in fashion and the colours are bright and bold for winter: “Lipstick Red”, “Strawberry Ice” and “Royal Blue”.
Children get “Christmas sweaters” in holiday colours of red, green, and white, with bold snowflake motifs in stranded patterning.There’s a frilly bed jacket in lightweight 3-ply and a waistcoat variation on the men’s pullover, as well. They’re photographed in colour on the inside back cover. Funny that, with all the brightly coloured garments in the issue, they chose the one beige garment for the colour photo! You do see the tweed flecks better, though. That amazing creation at the top of the page is the Royal Pavilion in Brighton, reproduced in fine embroidery in felt appliqué. This isn’t the first huge, complicated wall panel project we’ve seen and I can only assume that Stitchcraft had a really good appliqué designer.
The other homeware/decoration projects are small and easy, intended for little gifts, holiday bazaar sales or to brighten up the festive table. You can knit a little puppy doll complete with its own fully dressed bed, or make some silly but nonetheless cute egg cosies (the human-looking one is supposed to be Friar Tuck.) There’s a “pinny” apron to sew for a child, party table mats with a star motif, and these stuffed and embroidered felt stars to hang on the tree. I made one of these last year and will probably make some more this year — they are quick to make and just the thing for a mini-present.
If you have a little more time (but don’t want to tackle the Brighton panel), you can knit a knitting bag, crochet a floor mat, or make a hard-wearing cushion in a standard “ribbon” needlepoint design. If you’ve really got some time on those long winter nights, you can make a set of dining-room chair seats in tapestry, or a large pile rug in a “Byzantine” design. (Beautiful leather satchel in that photo as well! It’s a just a prop, though, of course — Stitchcraft‘s crafts didn’t extend to leather-work.)
Then there’s this design for a little sewn bag with an embroidered horse named Archie on it. Archie, since you asked, is the horse in the children’s comic “The Smuggler’s Sack”, which has been running on the back pages of Stitchcraft for the past few months. It features children Joe and Jenny, who live in a waterfront town whose mystery pirate/smuggler treasure has never before been discovered. Will they be the ones to find it at last? As of yet, they’ve found a mysterious box … which has a false bottom … which contains a map and a key .. which leads them to .. an inn called “The Smuggler’s Sack.” They’re disappointed, but could the inn hold the clue they’ve been looking for? Shades of Daphne du Maurier!
“Archie” will in fact feature in my December project, where I will be embroidering him onto a modern soft case / traveling bag for a pocket synthesizer.
Happy Holidays, everyone!
The Stitchcraft Sixties 