Episode 54 – Ravelry Founders Jessica & Casey

In Episode 54 our feature interview is with Ravelry founders, Jessica and Casey Forbes. Inside of 10 years Ravelry has turned the knitting industry on its head, enabling independent producers to really flourish, so it’s really cool to get to meet the couple who helped make this happen. We also meet the German indie designer Katrin Schneider as our guest in ‘Knitters of the World’, some fantastic sock designs are presented in ‘New Releases’ and our daughter Madeleine gives a quick update on her project. There’s another hike to a castle ruin on the edge of the Black Forest in #extremeknitting and a couple of finished objects to bring and brag about!

Ravelry Founders Jessica & Casey Forbes

Back in 2005 Jessica was very much involved in the knitting blogging community and was feeling very frustrated with not being able to keep track of the detailed information that bloggers were sharing about their knitting projects. Casey, her future husband, put his computer science brain to this problem and the result was the launch of Ravelry in 2007. Ravelry now has over 6 million users and it is still a private company with Casey and Jessica at the helm and 3 employees. During the interview you get to hear the early struggles and challenges that Jessica and Casey went through but also the wonderful and generous contributions that came from their early supporters.

Finding Jessica & Casey

• You can find Ravelry at ravelry.com (We’ll you just never know…)
• Jessica is:
  • frecklegirl on Ravelry
  • jessica.mf on Instagram
  • jessicamf on Twitter
• Casey is:
  • casey on Ravelry
  • caseyf on Twitter

And… Jessica is wearing her Metal Cardigan by Amy Christoffers.

Katrin Schneider

Katrin is a truly passionate knitter and designer. When she isn’t working as an IT specialist, she’s knitting. Her first design came out in 2016 and was an immediate hit and her Ravelry Store now has over 22 gorgeous highly wearable designs. Katrin’s designs first came to our attention at the EYF earlier this year when Aimee from La Bien Amiée showed us the Winterfell cardigan, designed to showcase Aimee’s latest colourway of the same name.

Patron Discount – Katrin Schneider

Katrin is offering our Patrons a 25% discount on all her patterns in her Ravelry Store. We are very excited that she has offered this because we think her designs have a very wide ranging appeal.

Finding Katrin Schneider

• Ravelry
• Instagram

Paper Daisy Creations – Socks of Wonderland

Lisa Ross of Paper Daisy Creations has created some super cool sock designs.  We particularly love the mosaic socks called Impossibly Possible. As Lisa writes, it is a chance to make the impossible possible – with mosaic knitting you can give the illusion of stranded colourwork while only working one colour at a time.

Patron Discount – Paper Daisy Creations

Lisa has offered our patrons an amazing discount of 50% off all her patterns in her Ravelry store. Lisa has some great sock patterns but also quite a lot of kids patterns including little cardigans and jumpers for both boys and girls which you will see modeled by her very cute kids. Patrons enjoy this offer!

Finding Paper Daisy Creations and the Socks of Wonderland

• Ravelry
• paperdaisycreations.com
• Instagram

Zweig by Caitlin Hunter

Andrea is thrilled with her minimally modified Zweig. She used Eden Cottage Yarns for the main body colour and the Norwegian Sandnes Garn (alpaca, silk blend) for the yolk.  The main modification was the change of gauge. The pattern is 24 st, 31 rows to 10 cms with 5-10 cm positive ease. Andrea used her gauge of 28 sts and chose a larger size ending up with a garment that has around 2 cm negative ease. This gives the sweater a more fitted look which she prefers. She also added a couple of rows of the yellow at the end of the cuffs because she just loves the yellow!

Under Construction

Hearten and Float by Kim Hargreaves

 

Audrey in Unst by Gudrun Johnston

Madeleine is learning new skills on this simple and elegant fitted cardigan by Gudrun Johnston. It’s her first time doing lace, three needle bind off, picking up stitches around the armhole and German short rows. You can find our interview with Gudrun Johnston in Episode 38.

Whelk by Martin Storey

The back piece of the vest is now being celebrated as a finished object and we are hoping the front will speed along!

What we are wearing

Madeleine is wearing Lovage by Marie Wallin

Andrew is wearing Guido by Carlo Volpi

Andrea is wearing Zweig by Caitlin Hunter

Music Credits

• Beethoven, Symphony No. 3 in E Flat Major Eroica, Op. 55 – IV. Finale Allegro molto, Public Domain
• J. S. Bach, The Well Tempered Klavier, Prelude No. 3 in C-Sharp major, BWV 848, performed by Kimiko Ishizaka, used under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0License
• Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky, SouvenirDeFlorence, Op. 70, 1 – AllegroModerato, performed by the US Army Strings, Public Domain
• Montana Skies, Lift, used under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License