Amy’s Thread: Colorways

Choosing colors always the hardest part of a stranded knitting project for me. This is one the most common questions we get, so I’m guessing it is for you too! The Helen/Ellen KAL kicks off tomorrow, for those of you still working out the perfect color ways I’ve got a strategy for you.

Color is very personal. Because we all see it just a little differently, it is hard for us to tell you what to pick. When planning a color work project I like to make a big yarn pile with all the colors I’d like to use and add or subtract colors until I feel like the combination is just right. Since we don’t always have the luxury of a giant stash or well stocked LYS to pull from I have a simpler solution for you: the website DesignSeeds.com. They have a huge library of beautiful photographs for inspiration with the shades already pulled out for you.

Here is a soft winter palette from the Design Seeds site:

And here I’ve matched 6 shades of Berroco Ultra Alpaca to the color palette: 62189 “Barley”, 62168 “Candy Floss Mix”, 6283 “Lavender Mix”, 62174 “Dungaree Mix, 6278 “Stone Washed Mix”, 6206 “Light Grey”

And now I’ve translated those shades into my Ellen chart. The version on the left uses “Dungaree Mix” as the main color, the version on the right uses “Barley” as the main color.

Here is a brighter more saturated image with bright citrus color, this time I’ve matched it to 6 shades of Berroco Vintage.

Vintage shades: 5136 “Birds egg”, 5163 “Caribbean Sea”, 5185 “Tide Pool”, 51180 “Grapefruit”, 5127 “Butternut”, 5124 “Kiwi”. This chart uses “Caribbean Sea” as the main color.

We’d love to see the colorways you’re using for your Helen sweater or Ellen Cardigan. Please share your colorways by posting your swatches in the Ravelry group or tag Instagram photos with the hashtag #BerrocoKAL.