Well, I’m doing it! I’ve jumped right in and started ANOTHER Metropolis sweater. This one will be very similar to my first Marled Metropolis except it will be GREEEEEEEEN! I am toying with the idea of a split hem too. We’ll see how wild I’m feeling.
I don’t always work this organized when I’m playing with colour but this time I wanted to go through a specific colour gradient (I was much more go-with-the-flow on my first Marled Metropolis, I didn’t have a set plan but just went where the yarn took me!) For this one I wanted to be a bit more deliberate with my colours and rooted through my stash and chose all of my yellows, greens and a few super dark blues and blacks. (FYI - this is way more yarn then I will need for my sweater, I just pulled everything and will use a little bit of each - so don’t let the volume intimidate you!) I’m using our mohair in Green Light throughout - I find the mohair really helps make all these colours blend. It adds a fuzzy halo that smooths out any rough transitions. Another trick that I’m fond of for this style of gradient marled knitting is to choose a few “anchor” skeins and keep them pretty consistent throughout. This is kinda hard to explain but I’ll try. Basically, I’m holding 3 strands of fingering + 1 strand of mohair throughout. The mohair stays consistent and that helps to ground it, but I’ve also chosen a light speckle (Retro) and a dark speckle (the dark rainbow/green that you can see pretty clearly in the photo below) and I will use those more than my other colours. I’ll switch the other 2 strands before I switch out those ones. The lighter one will be held for the majority of the top section and then when I get to the darker bit towards the bottom I’ll use the darker speckle and switch out the other 2 fingering weight colours more frequently.
Yeah, so hard to explain! Perhaps a photo will help. See the photo above of my pink/purple Marled Metropolis? I held a light pink speckle for the first third of the sweater switching out the other 2 colours from natural and sand to yellows and golds. There’s lots of action and lots of colour variety but that light pink speckle is consistent (along with the mohair). Then when things got brighter and more orange/red I switched my “anchor” speckle to a hot pink and you can see that though the light purple section. The entire bottom third of the sweater features a really dark purple held with various dark blue/blacks. So even though I used upwards of 20 colourways and so many odds and ends in this sweater I used 3 anchor colours that I think really help to make the gradient work. If you’re curious, the 2 pinks I used are leftover from my Find Your Fade Shawl.
I hope that kinda makes sense! I know that working with so much colour can be intimidating and though there is no right or wrong way to do it I find that this little trick really helps. And when you’re picking your anchor shades, don’t be shy to go with something really crazy! The extra colours of a rainbow speckle help add a randomness to the gradient and also tie in colours that came before and after.
I finished the yoke and separated for the sleeves last night and hope to just cruise through the body this week. I’m dying to get to that darker speckle and see how it knits up with the rest of these beauties!