For those having trouble visualizing the knitted-blank technique, here is a photo of my knitted blank (folded into halves, then folded again so I could fit it into the photo):
And here are the bobbins wound from it:
It’s hard to see the gradual color progression across each bobbin in the photo, but it’s very lovely.
I’m pleased to say that the knitted blanks unraveled VERY easily and quickly – I used my electric bobbin winder and it unraveled as fast as it wound. I’m tempted to try this with a weaker weft than 30/2 silk – say, some of the vast quantities of 2/28 cashmere/silk blend I have lying around.
It seems to me that the color ways are so long that one could just as easily dye small individual hanks in a carefully gradated series. This wouldn’t be hard to do, especially with the electric frying pan and small canning jars.
Certainly! And that’s how I’ve done it in the past. However, it’s quicker and easier to do using a knitted blank, and the color transitions are more gradual due to the blending of the dyes. You also don’t have to mess with twenty different bobbins/pirns – in my last shawl (using the gradated skeins method) I was literally changing pirns every quarter inch!
The advantage to the gradated skeins method is that you get much more fine control over the color transitions – you can literally choose it thread by thread. Also, you can dye enough for two or three shawls, and choose your colors on the fly.
I don’t think either method is necessarily better – but want to try both!