Sunday, July 22, 2012

Knit to crochet: Lost in translation

I'm a firm believer that some patterns are best suited to knit and some patterns are best suited to crochet.

If you are like me and generally prefer one technique over the other (in my case, if given a choice, I would always choose to crochet a piece and only resort to knitting as a last resort).

But sometimes it's fun to take an attractive pattern that was designed in one technique and attempt to translate it to the other technique - for example, to take a pattern designed for knit and translate it into crochet.

That's what I recently attempted to do with Adela Illichmanova's lovely and unique Capucine hat, which she designed for knit. (The following samples were made with Lily Sugar'n Cream Cotton from 14-ounce cone in 02178 Potpourri.)

I worked up her basic pattern (meaning just the hat portion without adding the finishing tassels).



However, translating from one technique to another does not always yield the desired result - or if it does, sometimes it requires more than one attempt to be successful, as we will see here.

As I was working, I could tell that what I was crocheting was going to turn out to be far too small to fit an adult's head, and by the time I was about halfway through with the ridged portion, I could see what my piece was becoming: My first attempt to translate Adela's knitted Capucine design into crochet resulted in what I can only call a girl's pioneer-style sunbonnet. (And probably in a toddler girl's size at that.) So I finished it up by adding some chin ties and will pass this first translation "failure" along to one of my grandnieces for dress-up playtime. (Of course, it really isn't a "failure" if you end up with something usable, eh?)




But there is definitely a big difference between the knitted Capucine hat (left) and my first attempt to translate it to crochet (right).


Now back to the drawing board to try again! That's the fun part.