Harbour Blanket :: Introduction

Good morning, good morning! If you're here looking for the new Harbour yarn pack, click on the following link to go straight there >>

♥ HARBOUR YARN PACK ♥

I hope you'll also enjoy reading today's post where I'm sharing a bit more of the inspiration behind this blanket. I promise that I'll try not to go overboard with all my millions of coastal photos, I'll save some for the CAL :)

Earlier in the year I was lucky enough to take a late Spring jaunt over to the Yorkshire coast with a friend of mine, partly because we both felt in need of a little holiday and partly because I knew I wanted to gather in some visual inspiration. It was mid May and we were exceptionally lucky with the weather - May here in Yorkshire wasn't that great, but on the two days that we spent by the sea we were treated to (mostly) blue skies and some very welcome sunshine.

We stayed in one of my favourite places on the coast, a place that I've visited many, many times during the three decades that J and I have been together. This is Whitby, a picturesque little seaside town with a busy fishing harbour which is deservedly popular with tourists who come to enjoy the beach and the friendly atmosphere. There is a distinct holiday vibe here which I absolutely love and it always makes me happy to spend time around the harbour and in the very old part of the town which is steeped in history. 

I've been thinking about creating a blanket inspired by the colours found at traditional seaside harbours for many years. This is often the way I work, and it's not unusual for me to ponder on creative design ideas and colour palettes for a really long time before it feels right to bring them to fruition. 

During the few days I spent at the coast I did a lot of walking - coastal walking is one of my favourite activities and I absolutely adore it, especially when the weather is playing nice. We walked for many miles, following the Cleveland Way as it ambled up and down the steep cliffs which hug this coastline. I took a LOT of photos, way too many to share with you today, so I'll save them for the CAL so that we can look forward to some coastal views as we make our ripply rows. What I mainly want to show you today is a little bit of the inspiration I found around the fishing harbours, not just in Whitby but also the charming village of Staithes. There aren't nearly so many boats at Staithes as the harbour is tiny compared to Whitby but oh my goodness, the colours are beautiful. 

I mean, just look how colourful and jaunty it all is!! I adore the jolly, carefree summer vibe that these colourful boats invoke, it makes me feel incredibly happy right down to my toes, especially on this grey, cold misty day in mid November when summer seems so far away. I love love love the way that the colours of the boats look so vibrant against the backdrop of coastal blues - those vibrant "pops" of colour light up my colour-loving soul and I can't get enough of them.

It's not just the boats that bring colour to the harbour - vibrant colour is all around once you begin to look for it. These lobster pots really caught my eye with their bright turquoise, jade, mustard yellow and orange netting and I took a gazillion photos of them from every imaginable angle. I hope you appreciate that I'm showing enormous restraint by showing you just one!

May time is full of glorious colour in the countryside, and along the Yorkshire coastline you get to see the country and coast combined. I noticed lots of colour in the fields as it was the time of year when rapeseed crops were in full bloom, and I loved seeing some self seeded flowers right down at the edge of the harbour. These flowers were so gloriously bright that I knew I would have to include some yellow and fresh green in my Harbour colour palette. 

I love the cosy tumble of these Yorkshire seaside villages and everywhere we went I took note of the colours. The terracotta pan tiled rooftops are a very distinctive feature of the Yorkshire coast and look wonderful against a backdrop of cool blue sea and sky.

I also took lots (and lots) of photos of cute coastal cottages with brightly painted doors and colourful ceramic pots full of tumbling flowers - I'll show you more of those once the CAL starts. 

Of course, the overwhelming colour of the coast is blue, blue and more blue, and I couldn't be happier about that! I adore the cool part of the colour wheel and sea blues and greens are my most favourite colours in the whole wide world. Coastal walking is a real treat when the weather is good because sunny skies mean that there are soooooooooo many shades of blue to enjoy. The colours in the sea change minute by minute and I never tire of seeing it. I am quite obsessed by these coastal shades of water and sky, they just fill my soul with such a deep sense of calm and tranquillity. 

As I spent these wonderful hours and days beside the sea, I began to instinctively know how this blanket would look and feel. It would be dominated by blues, because, well....the endless expanse of sea and sky is hard to ignore. I wanted it to feel as peaceful as a wide open sea view - bright and breezy, but also calming and restorative.

And then at the same time I was excited to add in those gloriously vibrant pops of coastal colour that bring such energy and joy. Bright shades of red, orange and yellow which sing against a backdrop of cool blues. This is how I imagined the Harbour blanket would be......

....and I began to actually see the brightly coloured ripples dancing in front of my eyes long before I picked up my crochet hook. I just knew it would be a truly happy blanket - bright and breezy, jaunty and jolly, and full of summer feel good.

It was a huge amount of fun playing with the colours when I returned from my trip - this is the part of the design process which gives me the most happiness and satisfaction. Fortunately for me, Stylecraft has a really beautiful palette of blues and blue-greens to choose from and I had absolutely no trouble at all selecting my sea and sky shades. My biggest challenge was deciding on the overall balance of the colour palette. In other words, how to take the very bright colours of the harbour boats and balance them out with exactly the right amount of sea and sky. How much blue is enough??!!

It took me many weeks to make this decision, honestly, I take my colour balancing very seriously and a humungous amount of pondering goes on before I settle on the final palette.

I really, really hope you love the Harbour colours as much as I do, because I am absolutely head over heels for them!

As is usual for my blankets, I've chose fifteen shades of Stylecraft Special DK for my Harbour blanket

From left to right :

♥ Lipstick ♥  Tomato ♥  Spice ♥  Clementine ♥  Dandelion ♥

♥ Apple ♥ Aspen ♥ Spearmint ♥ Cloud Blue ♥ Turquoise ♥

♥ Aster ♥ Cornish Blue ♥  Storm Blue ♥ Denim ♥ Lapis ♥

You can find the Harbour yarn pack in my shop at Wool Warehouse, click on the following link...

♥ HARBOUR YARN PACK ♥

In the above photo, you can see the fifteen colours I chose and get a better idea of how the balancing act worked out. You can see that the blues and blue-greens take up more than half the space, with the bright boaty colours occupying a little less than half. Getting this balance right is really important and not to be underestimated -  a bold, stripy blanket needs careful handling if it's to look happy and jaunty without looking garish.

I'm so, so happy with how these colours play together, and I can't wait for you to see for yourself. The baby ripples are fabulous and make the colours look so playful and full of life.

As well as the random mix of Harbour stripes shown here, there will also be a second option to create a "colourwash" Harbour blanket where all fifteen colours are ordered in a very particular way. Over the past few years I've enjoyed giving more than one option for my CAL blankets and it's always wonderful to see the excitement as everyone makes their decision as to which version they prefer. I'll be sharing some sneak peeks of the two versions of the Harbour blanket a little bit closer to the start of the CAL.

It's hard to think of a coastal blanket without conjuring up ripples or waves, so I did the decent thing and settled on a pretty little eyelet ripple stitch for my harbour blanket. This is a wonderfully simple but effective ripple design which is SUPER EASY to crochet. It's perfect for newbie crocheters or for those who have maybe attempted the ripple in the past but not quite been able to get it to work. I promise you, this ripple pattern is easy-peasy and I can't wait to talk you through it when I share the pattern at the start of the CAL in January. I feel sure you'll love it. 

Now if you've followed along with my CAL's in the past, you might remember that every year I work on a collaboration with my lovely friend Rachel of EllieBethDesigns who designs and sells stickers for planners, journals and notebooks. We started working together for my Moorland blanket in 2017 and Rachel has designed a sheet of stickers for every CAL blanket since then. It's always such a delight to see how she takes my colour palette and comes up with the most delicious stickers - isn't she clever?! I'm not sure if you can see in the above photo, but there are stickers to add to a planner or journal to mark each week of the CAL, along with some very sweet little harbour inspired decorative stickers (I especially love the rows of harbour cottages).

Rachel has very kindly created a discount code especially for you, and you can use this to get 20% off any of her stickers.

Use code A24HARBOUR at the checkout for 20% off any order (one use per customer), either on the EllieBethDesigns website or Etsy shop. Here are the links for you >>

https://www.elliebethdesignsuk.com/

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/EllieBethDesignsUK

It goes without saying that I'm incredibly excited for this crochet-a-long, it's such a lovely thing to look forward to in the New Year once the sparkle of Christmas is behind us. Just a reminder that there is no need to sign up for this CAL - it's all very relaxed here in the Attic so all you need to do is gather your yarn together and join in when the free pattern is released on 7th January.

I'll be writing more about the CAL a little closer to the time (just over seven weeks until the CAL starts), but here is a quick round-up of information for you :

♥ The Attic24 HARBOUR CAL will will run for 8 weeks in total, beginning on Friday 7th January - that'll be the day when the pattern will be published here on my blog and I'll give you all the information you need to get started. I'll then give weekly updates every Friday throughout January and February 2022 so that we can make the most of weekend hooky time.

♥ There will be a full picture tutorial here on my blog for the new Harbour Ripple pattern. Each week I'll share the colour stripe order for the two different versions of the Harbour blanket I'm making (Mixed Stripe and Colourwash),

♥ The HARBOUR YARN PACK contains 15 x 100g balls of Stylecraft Special DK and is enough to make one blanket/throw. There is no printed pattern included in this pack, all pattern info will be here on my blog, with updates every Friday throughout January and February 2022. 

♥ The Harbour blanket will measure approx. 120cm x 175cm. You will need two packs if you wish to make a larger/double bed size blanket. I'll give starting chain/pattern guidance for those of you wishing to make larger (or smaller) blankets. 

I'm extremely grateful to my friends at Stylecraft Yarns and Wool Warehouse for all the hard work they've done to make sure that this gorgeous collection of yarn is here for you, especially in these still-tricky times. The CAL begins in just over 7 weeks, so hopefully enough time for you to gather your yarn together.

As always thank you so so much for keeping my company as I jaunt along with another blanket project. I know many of you are still hooking away on your Yuletide blankets, so I do hope you're still enjoying those colours and that you'll be ready for a bright and breezy change of scene in January?!

Thank you for being such wonderful friends, I appreciate you very much ♥

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♥ HARBOUR ♥

 

 

 

 

Comments

[heather burn]

hi
i am about to start my first blanket
wool arrived yesterday
colours are beautiful thank you

could you please tell me about the little wooden pegs to wind wool onto

are they old fashioned clothes pegs or something special? thank you very much Heather

[adin]

a href Terima kasih penjelasannya, saya akhirnya paham

[Liz Neto]

I am trying to find where to get the wooden things that you can tie wool to, so that you know which colour you are using. Can you let me know please.

[Margaret Carr]

I love making your blankets but never managed a wavey pattern. So I decided to try to make Harbour. Having got the first row set I then seem to have too many chains when I follow your instructions. for row 2 I can’t see where I’m going wrong. The only thing which would make it work is to Sk 3 instead of 2

[Catherine chapman]

Hi could you tell me where to find the pattern please xx

[ELisabeth Brown]

Hello. Having been a keen knitter for years I am new to crochet and love the idea of making a blanket. Discovering your attic24 blog has spurred me on to have a go. I have two yarn packs, Woodland and Harbour. Just one problem...... which one to do first? Delicious dilemma! Thanks for your lovely patterns Lucy.

[Kathrin]

So beautyful,where can i found the pattern.

[Kirti Khatnani]

Hi, i would like to start this blanket..because I love love this pattern. i live in canary islands.. i have ordered my wool from Woolwarehouse but the pkt is lost… i have other colours and would lime to start this blanket… Can i have the pattern pls.. Thanks a Million..

[Susan Smith]

Hi.
I would love to make the harbour blanket but I am an absolute beginner. Will this be ok or is it a little too adventurous?

[Maggie]

Got it! Hooray! Thanks 😃💕

[Maggie]

I'm very much looking forward to starting my Harbour cal and have brought the whole bag of yarn to start today, Friday 7th Jan but so far I can't find the cal. Am I looking in the right place?

[Fiona Green]

I love these colours! I've bought 2 packs...only for me and one for my Mum's birthday! However, I'm still doing the Meadow blanket, so I shall start when I've finished my other projects 😆

[Jan]

hope i can pick up my yarn today

[Clare]

Hi what time is the Harbour pattern being posted please

[Jo]

Hello, is this really simple enough for a complete beginner? My intention this year is MORE COLOUR and MORE FUN in my life so this would be perfect. I can knit but haven't crocheted more than a few practice stitches!

Also, what size hook do I need, I can't find that info anywhere. I've only got a 3mm one.

Thank you 😊

[Kate]

Very glad I only got my wool this week, because now I can't wait to start!

[Lorenza]

I'm looking forward to begin so much! Even thought we were Friday today! 🤣😃😂
Take care!

[Orla Hamilton]

Love, love love this pattern !!! But I have too much yarn to buy another yarn pack, so am using stylecraft dk I have in my stash. Doing a random stripe blanket, using online stripe generator but it's asking how many rows !!
How many rows will be in the Harbour blanket?

[Suzan]

Another Brisbane, Australia girl who is itching to start. I even put off elbow surgery so I can do this blanket.

[Mary Heah]

Happy New Year from Brisbane Down Under😎, my Harbour Kit arrived a few weeks ago, the colours are bright, inviting and I am looking forward to getting started.My goal is to finish the blanket for my Grandson🥰🥳

[Lita Elizabeth Ashley]

Love the pics Lucy, I've spent some lovely family hols in Whitby and Staithes is definitely charming, a brother-in-law of mine used to live there. It makes a change from the flat country side of Lincolnshire where I live.
I always feel uplifted when I see all your colourful crochet. Happy New Year! Lita x

[Virginia]

Happy New Year from Melbourne Australia. I have received my Harbour Kit and so looking forward to doing this CAL. I finished my first Attic 24 pattern, Yuletide and love love love it. I am now addicted to your patterns. Have bought Hydrangea, Cosy and Sweet Pea as well. Love your work and eye for colour. Your patterns are well written and very easy to follow. Thank you. :) :)

[Michelle]

Wool Warehouse is so easy to order from, with quick shipping to the middle of the USA! I’m so looking forward to this project!

[Rebecca Newman]

Having visited Staithes every summer for the past 15 years, I can't begin to tell you how much I am looking forward to working on this pattern. The colours will help pass the time until we can visit our haven again. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart for capturing the essence of the village so perfectly.x

[Helen Butt]

It's a long while since I've really been shopping in Leeds, even though I technically live here. Whenever I walk in Victoria Gate, I imagine I'm going to slip!

Anyway, I hope you are feeling better now. Have a good 2022.