Welcome to the first installment of the Design Series: Inspiration.

I want to preface this posting with a disclaimer of sorts:
I am calling myself a designer because that is what I am striving to be. However, you will find that my design resume is rather short. I have one design self published, one design to be published by a magazine, and several more self published designs waiting for their final write-ups. I don’t intend for this series to sound like it’s coming from a professional design perspective. I’m a beginner, maybe as you are. I just wanted to share my process, and possibly inspire some other knitters to take the reins of their own design dreams.

And now, inspiration…

The inspiration for a design could come from anywhere. Sometimes inspiration sneaks up on me and catches me unaware at the grocery store or during my commute to work. I keep a little notebook with me at all times in order to capture these ideas. Other times, it’s like trying to get my husband to take out the trash. For those hard times, I like to surf around on Ravelry or Flickr for ideas and inspiration.

When designing for a magazine submission, you can sign up to get inspiration boards from the editor. Shortly before submissions are due, the editor sends out an e-mail, or posts a PDF online, with pictures and ideas to guide you to what types themes, colors and feel they are trying to achieve. These boards are like writing prompts, something to get your brain moving.

This is nice for designers looking to be published in a magazine. However, one of the things that makes magazine designing difficult is the time line. Magazines are planned well ahead of the season. So it can be hard to think of heavy winter designs when it is ninety degrees outside.

One of the strongest influences for me is nature. Not just flowers and colors, but even simpler things like seasonal weather. As spring blooms around me I know the temperature is going to fluctuate both inside and out.

1. Early Spring, 2. Dew, 3. Y’a d’la joie! – There is joy!, 4. Shadow Dance

I work in an office where thermostat wars keep the temperature ranging from “Antarctica” to “Surface of the Sun”. The perfect accessory for the office is a wrap or shawl, something easy to take off or put on when the wars heat up.

If I were only making a personal pattern, inspiration would stop here. This is something that meets my needs, and that is what matters. However, I really want to design something that not only I will use, but also something that I hope other knitters will want to knit and use as well. Therefore, I also keep in mind trends in knitting as I see them.

For example, I know that a lot of knitters are interested in knitting shawls. There is a popular knit-along called 10 in 10 – where knitters around the globe are attempting to knit ten shawls during the year 2010. So I pop over to that group in Ravelry to check out what types of shawls these knitters are excited about.

One of the trends I see is that for many, the idea of knitting a delicate lace shawl with impossibly thin lace-weight yarn is impractical, time consuming, and downright scary . Lots of knitters are gravitating towards small patterns designed for fingering weight yarn. Not only do they work up quicker, but sock yarn is something that everyone seems to have plenty on hand – including me.

I have a HUGE sock yarn stash, and a shawl would be a great way to use some of that yarn for a project other than socks. Recently, I made a shawl using Dream In Color Smooshy. I loved working with it and happen to have several other skeins. Other sock yarns I have generous amounts of include Blue Moon Fiber Arts Socks that Rock (I have also used this to make a shawl) and Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sock. I will try out these different yarns when I start swatching.

I also use Ravelry in a different way. I want my shawl design to be unique and memorable. So, I spend quite a bit of time researching to make sure that I don’t end up stealing someone’s ideas. This may or may not work for you. It can be hard taking in all those ideas, and not being influenced by them. But I feel better about my finished pattern if I know I tried my best to create an original piece.

The next step for me is taking all these ideas and distilling them into sketches and swatches. Come back next Monday to see how the inspiration starts to take shape!

Tags: design, Design Series

This entry was posted on Monday, March 22nd, 2010 at 7:30 am and is filed under Design Series. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.