“Extreme knitting” is a phrase used by textile artist Rachel John to describe her work, and is, essentially, very large scale knitting on supersized needles.
John has taken this to great lengths, including knitting a piece of work using 1,000 strands of yarn. This is intriguing rather than useful for most knitters, but the technique can be used to make interesting and practical knitted objects.
Materials.
Needles.
Oversized needles can be made from wooden broom handles or dowelling, or bought. Some yarn stores will stock needles up to 20 mm. Larger needles are available from Rachel John’s website and other specialist craft sites.
Yarn.
This technique works by using many strands of yarn together. This means that extreme knitting projects are great stash-busters that “grow” very quickly.
Uses of Extreme Knitting.
The work produced can be extremely thick and heavy and is obviously unsuitable for items with intricate shaping.
However, if light yarns are used which have a soft drape, beautiful shawls and wraps could be quickly made using the technique.
It is in the household, however, that extreme knitting comes into its own; it can be used to make thick rugs and floor mats as well as cushion and seat covers.
Heavy work:
It is important to bear in mind the weight of the project you’re working on; big projects with large numbers of stitches will be very heavy to work. It may be better to make up the fabric using techniques that only have a small number of stitches on the needles at any one time, such as modular knitting.
Use of colour.
It is possible for all of the strands of yarn used to be the same colour, giving a solid appearance to the work. However, one of the joys of extreme knitting is the combination of colours, shades and textures which add interest and subtlety to the work.
Stripes and blocks of colour can be added to this work, as with any other knitting. However, it is recommended that the strands for each “colour” are wound together into one ball of yarn. This will make it much easier to strand the yarn behind the work and twist two colours together.
It may take some knitters a little while to get used to knitting on such a large scale, as the yarn cannot be wrapped around the fingers and “flicked” or “picked” in the usual way but the growth rate of the work more than makes up for any loss of speed in knitting technique.
Extreme knitting, therefore, is ideal for those who like their knitted things chunky and who enjoy seeing their work develop quickly. Rugs can be made in a weekend and this technique is great for using up all of those part balls left over from other projects.
It is unlikely that any knitter will want to make all of their items on this scale, but it’s an interesting and satisfying way to eat into the yarn stash and play with colour, while making something beautiful and practical for the home.
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