Guest Blogger: Pam Powers

This week, we have a special treat for our readers: knitwear designer Pam Powers joins us to share two of her newest designs using Blue Sky Alpacas yarns. Pam has self-published many patterns over the years, and her recent work has focused mainly on accessories. Pam tells us that she especially enjoys the freedom of designing scarves because there are so many shapes and sizes to explore. We hope you enjoy Pam’s take on the modern handmade aesthetic in these exciting new designs!

When I initially started planning my book, Dress-to-Impress Knitted Scarves, I wanted some of the designs to have an ethereal or Bohemian look. My goal was to take traditional heavy knitted scarves and lighten them up with the use of design and color, so immediately I thought of Blue Sky Alpacas Worsted Hand Dyes color palette. Pastel colors can be a little tricky if you don’t want your garment to resemble baby knits. There needs to be a certain amount of saturation to the color, while still retaining lightness. Worsted Hand Dyes is also a yarn that has a good amount of heft to it, unlike baby yarns, but still retains a softness due to the royal alpaca and fine merino blend.

The two pieces from my book using Blue Sky Alpacas Worsted Hand Dyes are Chantilly Ascot and Bow Tie Ascot. Both of these pieces have the pull-through ascot shaping which I think is a nice, flattering silhouette for a short scarf. You can keep the piece snug around your neck without the bulk of tying.

Chantilly Ascot is a rather complex twisted-stitch lace pattern that I found in a Japanese stitch dictionary. Having the patterning only on the ends makes it a more manageable project. And I think this shade of blue, Lagoon, is just a beautiful robins egg blue that you don’t see very often in yarn.

Bow Tie Ascot is from my existing pattern collection. I originally did a kids version of this scarf with fun colorwork, but then altered the shape, made it one color and added cables to make it more adult-like.

Light Pink is the perfect “ballerina pink”, so I naturally thought of my daughter Claire, who happens to be a ballerina, to model it.

The shape is similar to a men’s bow tie, so you don’t have to worry about tying it just right to keep the perfect bow shape.