I have finished reading 'The Great Gatsby,' and am looking forward to our book club discussion about it. I also completed the raglan sweater I posted about in last weeks Yarn Along. The pattern was vintage, and like most vintage patterns I have come across, was knit flat and then stitched together. The Raglan and Lace jacket above is a modern pattern and is knit in the round - the body on circulars and the sleeves on double pointed needles. The sleeves are then slipped on to the circular needles in a simple and ingenious way. Knitting techniques never fail to amaze me.
Modern and vintage patterns both make use of double pointed needles, though you don't often see vintage patterns call for circular needles, do you? Which lead me to wonder when circular needles were in fact invented. I discovered this fascinating page on knitting history, which informed me that the first US patent exists from 1918, though they may have been used even earlier than this in Europe. The use of four or five double pointed needles to knit in the round dates from the twelfth century. This fifteenth century image of a 'Knitting Madonna' is thought to be the earliest image of circular knitting with dpns. And though none of that explains why vintage patterns tend to be knit on straight needles, I do love a bit of knitting trivia.
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Joining in with Ginny's Yarn Along.
