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Fiber Factor Contestants Named

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fiber factor design contestA while back I told you about the Fiber Factor, a knitting design competition that will pit 12 designers against each other and the clock for a chance at a trip to Germany for the big winner.

The contestants were announced over the weekend, and it looks like a fun, diverse bunch. There are two guys among the 12, and the contestants range in age from 21 to 55. There are three New Yorkers, but the rest come from all over the country, which should be good fun.

The first challenge was announced this week as well. I don’t know how much the viewing public will be kept up on what’s going on behind the scenes, but I’ll bet at least some of these designers have blogs and will be talking about the process as they are able. The winner of each of the six challenges will win $500, so there’s a lot riding on the competition throughout.

I’m excited to see how it all turns out and will keep you posted on events as they unfold.

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Comments

  1. It would be great if they had one link and we could keep up with all the contestants. I will try to ‘watch’ out for this. Going to mark my calendar for their first completed challenge..May 1.

Have you read?

Make Your Knitting Machine Scarves Better

I feel like it’s been a while since I’ve shared any patterns for our circular knitting machine users. I know these devices aren’t for everyone but even though I much prefer knitting by hand, it is kind of fun to crank things out on these machines.

One of the most common early projects for a circular knitting machine is a scarf. Which makes sense, because it’s just one long tube and you can make it as long as you like.

One problem that comes from knitting scarves on the circular knitting machine, though, is that it can be hard to know how to finish the ends of the tube so that it looks like a finished scarf and not a tube of knitting.

If you’re not a knitter or crocheter, the most basic way to finish a circular knitting machine scarf is just by cinching up the ends and maybe adding a pompom to each end to cover up any hole that might still be visible at the end.

But if you have a little knitting or crochet skill or are willing to learn, there are a lot of different options for closing up the ends of a scarf. And this would also be true if you hand knit a tube scarf!

I recently wrote a post over at Our Daily Craft that includes five different ways to close up the ends of a tube scarf:

  • the simple cinching method mentioned above
  • sewing the stitches together
  • three needle bind off
  • grafting
  • crochet bind off

Grafting is my favorite because I feel like it gives the cleanest, closest to a seamless look. If you’re a knitter you may already know how to do it but even if you don’t it’s not that hard to learn.

Do you knit tube scarves by hand or machine? I’d love to know how you like to finish them!