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CHAPTER 1
Choosing Yarns
Enter a good yarn shop today and you'll find a choice of yarns so lavish as to be daunting. One way of getting control of the situation is to arm yourself with knowledge about yarns, so that you know just what it is you are paying for.
Understanding the elements that combine and interact in any given yarn will help you make wise yarn choices. We'll look at what weights and fibers are best suited for a chosen project, how to compare quality and prices, how to recognize tightly and loosely spun yarns, and much more. By the end, you'll be an educated shopper.
Before going any further, let me say that there is no difference between yarn used for knitting and yarn used for crochet. Occasionally I hear stories from crocheters who are told that only certain yarns are suitable for crochet. Please don't believe such statements! Each craft produces a different result with the same yarn, and you may prefer the look of a particular yarn in crochet and another in knitting. But truly, you can crochet with any yarn!
Many crocheters limit themselves to certain weights of yarn, such as worsted or bulky, and certain fibers, such as superwash wool or acrylic, because they feel unsure of how to work with unfamiliar yarns, for budgetary reasons, or because other yarns are not easily available to them. No one can deny these concerns, but the fact is that crocheting with a wider range of fibers and yarn weights dramatically expands the quality and variety of projects you can make.
Most of the stitch patterns crocheters know and love derive from the nineteenth century, when crochet as we know it came into being. Nineteenth-century needle hobbyists enjoyed not only crochet, but tatting, knitting, and embroidery. They generally used very fine threads, thinner than anything manufactured today. During this period, intricate laces were very much in fashion, and the crochet hook turned out to be an excellent vehicle for making lace. From the middle of that century to its end, the growing popularity of crochet demanded more designs and publishers of patterns, resulting in a gradual accumulation and dissemination of literally thousands of stitch patterns, techniques, motifs, edgings, and designs. This is the vocabulary of crochet handed down by our Victorian ancestors.
While technically it's possible to crochet any stitch at any gauge, many of these intricate stitch patterns lose their charm when blown too far out of proportion. Yet so rich is the store of these patterns that it's a shame to omit them from one's repertoire. Finer yarns allow a great many more of these stitch patterns to be successfully wrought: lace stitches, motifs, and edgings look wonderful with finer yarns such as sport, fingering, or lace weight.
A range of fibers, too, is important to fully explore crochet's possibilities. Working with quality fibers that make yarns softer, more colorful, lustrous, smooth, or textured enriches the crocheting experience immeasurably. Often crocheters think of themselves merely as hobbyists, but working with a wider range of fibers, colors, and textures can bring out the hidden artist you didn't even know was there!
Following yarn from its sources through the manufacturing process shows how each step impacts the finished product and helps predict how the yarn will behave when crocheted. This knowledge helps us choose the best yarn for a particular project, match yarn with compatible stitches, select the most appropriate hook size, and substitute yarns in a pattern when necessary.
In this chapter, we will also take a look at crocheted fabric and examine how to choose yarns and stitches that create the most suitable fabric for a project. This is an important element in upgrading the quality of your crochet.
Yarn Sources
Yarns may be made of animal, plant, or synthetic fibers. Here are some of the common yarns you may encounter, organized by source.
Animal Fibers
All animal fibers have the advantage of being somewhat elastic and breathable, trapping air and thereby creating warmth. Except for silk, animal fibers begin as hair. Wool comes from the fleece of sheep, alpaca from the South American camelid, and mohair and cashmere from special breeds of goats. Just as human hair can be silky and straight or coarse and curly, so animal hairs differ markedly, not only from one species to another, but also depending on the animal's age, location, and where the hair was on its body.
Wool has been used for textiles for many centuries, and humankind has learned to breed sheep to capitalize on those qualities that make the sheep best for this purpose. An example is the merino sheep, whose hair is very fine and soft. Merino yarns are more desirable and expensive than generic "wool" yarns, which mix hairs from a variety of different sheep and are coarser.
Wool fibers naturally have tiny scales that bind together. This is what causes wool, when subjected to hot water and agitation, to shrink and felt. To prevent this, some wool yarns are superwashed in a chlorine-based acid bath that removes the scales, or else they are coated with a polymer that prevents the scales from commingling. Sometimes both processes are used. While being able to put a wool item in a washing machine is a nice convenience, the downside is that superwashed wool is heavily processed. If you want a more natural wool, try high-quality wools that are not superwashed. These should be hand-washed in warm or cool water and air-dried.
Alpacas have been bred in Peru since prehistoric times, not as pack animals, but for their highly prized hair. Compared to wool, alpaca fiber is warmer, more lustrous, and wonderfully soft against the skin. Baby alpaca is even softer. Alpaca is fuzzier than wool and more prone to stretching; it must be blocked and washed with great care (see Blocking). Because of its excellent drape, alpaca is great for making crochet garments.
Mohair derives from the angora goat. (Note that an angora goat does not produce angora; for that, we turn to angora rabbits.) Like all animal fibers, mohair comes in a variety of grades and at its best can make a lustrous, very strong yarn. The finest quality — kid mohair — is taken from young animals and is not scratchy on the skin. Mohair can make a very light yet warm fabric, excellent for scarves and jackets. The finest-weight mohairs can also be used for indoor wearables.
Cashmere comes from another breed of goat originally from the Himalayas. This extraordinary fiber is 30 percent lighter than wool and yet eight times warmer. The animal produces a coarse outer coat not suitable for yarn and a downy undercoat. It is this remarkable downy undercoat, produced by each animal in very small quantities, that's used in cashmere. That's why cashmere is so expensive. If you can splurge on a skein or two, a cashmere scarf or hat can be quite divine!
Other animal sources include yak, buffalo, possum, qiviut, and camel, each with its own particular characteristics. If you enjoy working with new textures, keep an eye out for yarns featuring some of these less common animal fibers — they can be quite special!
Some animal fibers are more durable than others; for example, the softest cashmeres will not wear as well over time as a hardy wool. That's another point to consider when selecting yarns for a project.
Silk, which has been traced back as far as 3000 BCE, is the one animal fiber that does not begin as hair. When the silkworm forms its cocoon, it excretes a gummy liquid called sericin. By rotating its body some 200,000 times in three days, the insect coats itself in a continuous filament that, if laid out flat, would measure over a mile.
Bundles of these long strands are spun into silk yarn. For high-quality silk, the insects are cultivated and fed in a controlled environment, a labor-intensive process that drives up silk's cost. Yet such is the beauty of silk, and the power of its visual and tactile appeal, that it has commanded a high value for millennia. Silk yarns, or yarns that have a significant silk content, look and feel fantastic in crochet, and are recommended for crochet wearables of all kinds.
Plant Fibers
Plant fibers are composed of cellulose, a substance found in all plants in greater or lesser degrees.
Cotton fiber is 90 percent cellulose, wood 40 to 50 percent, and hemp 45 percent. Unlike animal fibers, which capture and hold heat, cellulose absorbs water at the plant's root and conveys it to the top of the stem. On humans, the cellulose fibers absorb moisture and then allow it to evaporate, drawing heat away from the body. That's why we wear plant fibers in warm weather.
While animal fibers are naturally elastic, meaning they bounce back after being stretched, plant fibers are not. Think of a cotton sweater that no longer holds its shape. Plant fibers are also denser than animal fibers, and this is significant for crochet. A worsted-weight cotton may be heavier in weight than a worsted-weight wool, and too much weight in a crochet project is something to be avoided.
Despite this, cotton, especially in finer-weight yarns, can be a great vehicle for crochet. Cotton thread has been used throughout crochet history to make lovely doilies, lace collars, Irish crochet motifs, and other refined examples of crochet. Cotton produces crisp, well-defined stitches, washes and dries easily, and does not pill. Higher quality cottons, such as pima and Egyptian, have longer fiber lengths, yielding a softer fiber. These softer cottons are excellent choices for crocheted wearables.
Linen comes from flax plants, one of the oldest sources of textiles. Linen was used in Egypt during the time of the pharaohs and dates to at least 5000 BCE. Its advantages are great: strength, durability, and luster. The fiber is naturally stiff, which gives good definition to stitches but works against drape. On the other hand, linen softens considerably over time with wear and washing, so it can make excellent wearables, depending on the weight of the yarn and the stitches used in a project.
Hemp is another fiber sometimes seen in yarns that derives from the cannabis plant. It is quite stiff and therefore is best used for items like bags or belts. It can also be rough on the fingers and hands.
Rayon and viscose are fibers made by chemically treating a substance, usually wood pulp, to soften it into a liquid. The liquid is then forced through an extruding device, something like a showerhead, from which it emerges as very long thin strands, which are spun into yarns. These fibers can be lustrous and have excellent drape, but they do not breathe well. They are often used in blended yarns to soften other stiffer fibers and to make a yarn more durable. In recent years, bamboo, milk, and a variety of other substances have been turned into yarns using this process.
Synthetic Fibers
Synthetic fibers commonly used in yarns are acrylic and nylon. Acrylic is soft and warm, but unlike natural fibers, it is not resilient or strong, cannot retain its shape, and is prone to pilling. Acrylic yarns vary in quality, with the best having a soft hand and attractive luster. As for nylon, it is generally used in sock yarns to add durability.
Yarn Manufacturing
Most yarns you see, whether in a big-box store or a small independent yarn shop, are manufactured by one of a handful of mills located in China, South America, Turkey, and Italy, with a few in the United States and Canada. These large mills make yarn for use in the textile industry; yarns for knitting and crocheting by hand are just a tiny part of their operations. Yarn companies work with these mills to create the products they think will be most enticing to consumers, changing fibers, weights, types of spin, and colors each season. With the limited number of mills across the world, inevitably you will see very similar yarns crop up across different yarn companies. Each company selects colors and packaging materials that distinguish its brand from competitors.
Yarn manufacturing for hand crochet and knitting is a relatively small industry, highly subject to that precarious segment of the economy: the consumer market. The industry's survival over the recent unstable economic period attests to the popularity of knitting and crochet.
Economy yarns are generally sold at large chain stores and represent by far the greatest segment of the yarn market. Smaller yarn manufacturers' products are sold primarily in independent yarn shops and increasingly online.
Manufacturers must balance desirable qualities in a yarn against its cost, and the price of the yarn will reflect those decisions. Yarns made to appeal to the budget-conscious shopper will use less natural fiber, which is more costly than synthetics, or else natural fibers of a lesser quality. More economical manufacturing means that color, nuance, and texture of the yarn may be sacrificed. Such workhorse yarns are made for durability and washability, with less emphasis on softness, subtle color variation, and the individual characteristics of different fibers.
A yarn shop offers a much greater selection of fibers and much more variation in price and quality than a big-box store. You will probably find shelves organized according to yarn weights. If you haven't explored many yarn shops, start by comparing yarns of the same weight and fiber from several manufacturers, choosing a popular type of yarn, such as 100 percent merino worsted or sock weight. Don't look at the price tag until you've spent some time ogling and fondling. You'll notice that color palettes vary, as does the twist and ply in the yarns, yielding many different surfaces and textures. Which ones appeal to your touch and eye? Armed with the knowledge in this chapter, choose a couple of skeins of some unfamiliar fiber and play with them!
If you enjoy buying from local artisanal producers, visit the fiber fairs and sheep festivals that happen all over the United States. There you'll find hand spinners and dyers who devote a great deal of labor to every step of their production process, thereby producing yarns of great character and individuality.
Spinning and Twisting
Humans have been spinning natural fibers for millennia, and the essential process has remained the same. Spinning is a process whereby millions of short lengths of fiber called staples are combined and subjected to simultaneous stretching and twisting, allowing them to adhere to one another, creating a single continuous strand of yarn.
In our modern manufacturing world, many steps turn the unprocessed animal, plant, or raw synthetic fiber into the product you buy as a ball or skein of yarn. Before being spun, natural fibers must be cleaned, then combed and carded. The carding machine separates the fibers and turns them into a thin web of fibers running more or less parallel. Other devices further elongate and tame the fibers into slivers (bundles) to make them ready for spinning.
Yarns derived from animal fibers are made by twisting these slivers. Some yarns are spun very tightly, others less so. This is largely dependent on the fibers. Shorter fibers such as merino and cashmere require more twist to hold them together; longer-staple fibers such as alpaca and silk require less. The degree of twist has a significant impact on the strength of the yarn, with more twist yielding a stronger and more compact yarn and low twist making a lighter, softer yarn. Fabric made with high-twist yarns will not wrinkle or pill as easily as those made with low twist. You can see how tightly spun a yarn is by observing the angle of twist: the closer to parallel with the strand of yarn, the looser; the more perpendicular, the tighter.
The Effect of Plying
Twisting fibers into a single continuous thread results in a single ply of yarn, often simply called a single. By convention, singles are spun with a Z twist, with the slant rising as it goes from left to right. When additional plies are added, they are twisted in the opposite direction, in an S twist, with the slant lowering as it goes from left to right.
Whether a yarn is spun with an S or Z twist can impact on a yarn's utility for crochet; since yarnovers are made in the direction of the S, loosely plied yarns may unravel and cause stitches to look untidy.
All yarns begin as a single ply, but only some are practical in this form; most yarns have several plies. Adding more plies improves the regularity of texture and color. But long-staple fibers such as alpaca and silk can make beautiful singles on their own, and single-ply yarns are excellent in crochet. The unplied, single strand is a plain surface that allows a stitch pattern to show up very cleanly and clearly.
Yarns can have two, three, four, or more plies, with each additional ply giving the yarn more strength. The additional plies do not necessarily make the yarn thick, though, since the strands being twisted together may be very thin. Sometimes the plies are very obvious on the yarn's surface, and sometimes they are more smoothly integrated. Note this characteristic when matching a yarn with a stitch pattern. Pronounced plies add complexity that, when combined with intricate stitch patterns, can make the surface overly busy.
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Excerpted from "The Crocheter's Skill-Building Workshop"
by .
Copyright © 2014 Dora Ohrenstein.
Excerpted by permission of Storey Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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