Gray study

Sometimes it’s fun to see what a yarn can do in different patterns. Here’s an experiment in Pebble, a somewhat sophisticated Knit Picks Dishie colorway. The cloth is a Ravelry freebie: Linda Smith’s Feather & Fan cloth. I especially like how the elongated-looking stitches in the feathery part, or maybe it’s the fan part, add a sense of movement to the stitch motif.

This circular cloth is Mielke’s Fiber Arts’ Knitted Round Dishcloth. Forgive the only sewn join in this short row cloth–up there in the top left quadrant. Not sure what happened. To my eye, Pebble looks disorganized in this cloth, but in an interesting organic way.

Here’s Pebble in Cecelia Fameli’s LINES Dishcloth. As the Ravelry pattern page shows, this Dishcloth is a well-behaved cloth when knit in one color. It’s all lines and more lines. But in Pebble it’s lines are obscured by color-pooling. Still, one good cloth.

Here’s a pretty one. It’s Deb Buckingham’s Spring Swatch Cloth later rechristened as the Marbles & Jacks cloth. Personally I do not see marbles or jacks. Not a bit. But I do see shoots of flowers growing from mounds. In this cloth, Pebble really shines. The open lace work creates an interesting effect in the white and shades of gray. And the draping garter stitch works well too.

This next one? This next one is Deb Buckingham’s Bellflower Dishcloth. Bottom line? Try again. Pebble makes it impossible to see what the heck is going on with this cloth. The center section is actually seed stitch, knit one purl one and then, essentially, purl one knit one in the next row. You don’t see it? I don’t either. The variegated yarn totally wierds out the cloth.

I realize that I’m ending this post with a whimper instead of a bang. But here’s another oinker. That is, another aesthetically successful cloth. This is Sammie Carraher’s Reversible Textured Dishcloth.

Not very impressive in Pebble. Check out Carraher’s pattern page and you’ll see that her cloth is quite pleasant to look at in a solid colorway. Not at all barfworthy, as when knit in Pebble.

It’s been a bit of a study in what to knit, and not, in variegated yarn. One good thing about dishcloth knitting is that nothing you knit is or needs to be precious. It’s a lowly dishcloth. Pretty or ugly, it works just the same.