blencathra

Guess where I’ve been? We had an amazing weekend (more on the fest shortly) but I thought I’d begin with where it concluded — a walk up Blencathra. Dominating the skyline of the Northern Lakes with its craggy buttresses and dark gulleys, this is a really distinctive and deservedly popular mountain. Predictably, we plumped for the most famous route of ascent — up Scales Fell and over Sharp Edge — an exposed, rocky and (for me) hairaising arête along which one must pick one’s way with care, before ascending Foule Crag, whose name speaks for itself. You can see both edge and crag to the right of Tom’s head in this photo.

Being some kind of bloke-weasel, who scampers up and down mountains on a daily basis, Tom rather scoffed at the purported challenge of the edge. But I, who scamper a bit less, was not nonchalant at all.

One of the problems with Sharp Edge is that it is not as sharp as it looks — so much of it has been worn smooth by the weight of a million walkers’ arses. The smoothness of the rock certainly increases the difficulty of scrambling about an exposed ridge in heavy boots. At the end of the arête you can see the base of Foule Crag — yes, the bare rock face on which those two white specks / people are about to take their chances. I confess I got the fear. We let the other edge-traversers head in front before I took my turn.

Me and my arse had a little difficulty getting around what Wainwright refers to as the “awkward place,” and the base of the crag is the foule-est bit of it. . . but with some help from Tom indicating the tricky hand-holds, I made it across and up. Fun! When you reach the summit, you are rewarded with views North across the Solway Firth to Scotland, and to the South and West, the peaks and lakes of Cumbria are all laid out before you. The spectacular fell architecture of Blencathra itself looks pretty good from up there as well.

We came down via Doddick Fell — a route which Wainwright recommends and which we thought was superb. What a great walk! So if you are ever going up Blencathra with a choice of ascents and are feeling a little nervy about what th’edge entails, I would say just go for it — its really not as hard as it looks. And can I say there is nothing better than a good Cumbrian pie at the top of a Cumbrian mountain. . .

or a pint of Cumbrian ale at the bottom.

birthday tea

Well, what else can you do when someone gets you a giant teacup for your birthday? This is how I spent yesterday evening.

All I can say about where I’m standing is that it was until recently waist-high with weeds, and that I am very proud of how that wall now looks since last week I thought it was just some sort of mossy hummock. I’m also pleased that my teacup (ahem, um, plantpot) co-ordinates so nicely with the trousers of my birthday buddy, Felix, who celebrates her 30th today. Happy Birthday Felix! I’m a bit older, but never too old to be ridiculous. And don’t worry, I took off the daft frock before I got on with some birthday digging. Cheers!

spent

You know when you get so physically tired that you can barely even speak? Well, I’ve been there a few times this week. It’s not an altogether unpleasant feeling — I find that toiling to the point of total exhaustion has a pleasing brain-clearing effect — at the end of an evening down the allotment, I’ve been too tired to think of anything much at all. But when I close my eyes to sleep, I still see the devilish shapes of marestail and shepherds purse dancing across my eyelids. Agch! Weeds! Weeds! I’ve been hacking them down, pulling them out and (as you see above) piling them up to dry. Today I began to burn ‘em.

Burn, weeds, burn!

Tackling the land at this stage really is a basic, physical struggle, but every day I notice that things are looking a little better. On Wednesday, for example, I cleared a mountain of ancient rubbish from out of the pond — including a long-dead newt, all bloated and white. But then yesterday, I found that a plump frog had happily re-established itself on the rocks I’d uncovered and weeded round.

frog buddy!

I weeded and mulched round the strawberries, and now they are ripening nicely

I found other fruits too

Never having had one before, the greenhouse is a luxury that I’m really enjoying — here come tomatoes. . .

People have been incredibly kind with seeds and plants: here are leeks – thanks to David and Mohini.

And though I’ve repainted the outside of the shed a nice allotment green to blend in with its surroundings, I allowed myself to go a bit beach-hut inside. . .

This shed has rooms. Rooms!

I planted out herbs and some other foolish things too — why not?

I love it all so much already.

just a couple of things

I’ve been meaning to mention:

After writing about station bars a few weeks ago, I felt compelled to visit the one at Manchester Victoria for old times sake. The view above eye level was just how I remembered it. Below, though, I encountered the evil Pumpkin. When I asked the barman if he had any ale on draught, he rolled his eyes and pointed to the bottles of Newky Brown in the fridge. Oh dear. The Centurion this was not. Thankyou, Lisa, for the link to this article, which sums up the sad situation in this beautiful space.

Also, following on from my chat with the marvelous Mrs Sew and Sew, I had to show you this fabric design I discovered in Drucilla Cole’s 1000 Patterns book. Look closely: those ’66’s refer to the annual ration allowance of clothing coupons, and the numbers beside each garment (ostensibly) refer to their respective coupon-cost. If the design is from the ’40s (as a reference in Cole’s book suggests) then this jolly fabric would itself have carried a cost in coupons . . . Cole doesn’t say much about it (her very good book is mostly an exposition of pattern design) and I am very intrigued by this fabric. If anyone knows anything at all about it, I’d be very interested to hear.

Thanks for all your entries in the bee-bag giveaway — I was particularly excited to see the comments of those who actually keep bees. How I wish they allowed hives on the allotment . . .

printing / giveaway

When I was back in Lancashire, I did some screen printing with my sister and Mr Steve — the brain and hands behind a number of great community arts projects in Rochdale. Neither Helen or I had tried screen printing techniques before, and the usual insane excitement that accompanies any craft activity we undertake was rather tempered by the feeling of being total novices. But no-one is allowed to feel inept in Mr Steve’s workshop, and, encouraged by him, we kept things simple, and tried out a couple of ideas.

One of Helen’s friends is about to get married in Liverpool, where they were both at University. Her idea was to translate the Liverpool city skyline, (as draughted by her architect friend Alistair) into screen-printed bags to accompany the hen night celebrations. In the photo at the top of this post, you can see Helen tracing her design onto acetate. The images below illustrate the printing fun that then unfolded. After exposing the screen, she tested out the design on paper, before picking out several iconic buildings in blocks of hand-mixed colour, which were then transferred to fabric. In the third picture you can see a hint of blue Mersey, and the red sandstone of the Anglican cathedral. And that’s Mr Steve there in the last pic.

Helen also transferred her design on to some cotton we cut out to shape, clothkits stylee, to make into skirts for each of us. These will be amazing . . . when we get round to sewing them up! (I will do so soon and where’s yours, Hels?!)

It was fascinating seeing the skyline come to life as each colour was successively printed. In comparison to Helen’s cityscape, my monotone design was rather plain and straightforward. I found an image of a bee, picked out some lines from a seventeenth-century book of emblems, scaled them up and traced them onto acetate in black ink. Mr Steve suggested we gave the screen a shorter exposure to allow for the fine lines of the bees wings and, um, leg hair. Then I took some calico bags and got to work with the ink and squeegees. Look! I made bees!

Having only printed with blocks before, I was amazed at how precisely this process transfers fine lines first to screen and then to finished fabric. Here is my final design. I love it!

I enjoyed the whole process, and particularly the actual printing. Heady with ink fumes and the thrill of making a thing, I whooshed my squeegee about, shouting some nonsense about Franklin, Blake and the printing press above the noise of the vacuum table. I got carried away, made quite a few bags, and thus have one to give away here. Would you like a me-designed, hand-printed bee-bag into which I shall place some other bee-themed goodies? If so, just leave a comment on this post before the end of the month (June 30th). I shall then select the winner at random, and post this worker bee off to its new home.

in case you didn’t know. . .

Today is World Wide Knit in Public day! It was a lovely, sunny morning, and Rebecca and I walked up into the centre of Edinburgh with our knitting. As you can see, she is very adept at knitting socks on the move.

. . . we met up with other knitters, and occupied the space behind the Scott Monument. . .

. . then the sky turned the colour of Mel’s knitting, and we headed over to K1 Yarns . . .

. . . where we formed live knitting displays in the shop windows

Happy World Wide Knit in Public Day!

ploughshares

It has been an insanely busy week! On top of the usual examining mountain that one must climb at this time of year, there has also been a whole lot of administrative gubbins that I’ve had to sort out quicksmart, as for the next couple of weeks my time is going to be taken up with. . . jury service. Amidst all of this, I have managed to spend a few precious and very excited hours here: yes, it is indeed the allotment. Honestly, I am completely blown away by it — I feel as if someone has given us an amazing gift of entirely unwarranted proportions. Actually, there’s no as if about it: someone has, and that someone is Billy, the bloke who tended it before us. . . (oh, and not forgetting the redoubtable Mr W of Edinburgh allotment services, who finally came through for us). Billy’s allotment is not just a piece of ground — it has an entire infrastructure. The sheds (note plural) come well-equipped with furniture, some tools (in reasonable nick), a stove and (joy!) a working chimney. There is also a greenhouse, a pond, well-built benches, fencing, and several bird boxes. The whole place is, of course hideously overgrown and in need of some repair — Billy can’t have done much here for the past season or two — but beneath the weeds we are beginning to uncover the shape of a thoughtfully laid out landscape. We are tackling the ground, and in a couple of small beds will be sowing what salad leaves and legumes we can — thanks to seeds from my dad (and some of you!) and a generous colleague who has donated squashes, tomatoes, and cucumbers.

Hacking my way through the undergrowth this week I have found many surprises, including an entire bed of strawberries battling stoically against the mare’s tail. Best of all, though, and in some wonderment, I discovered that the nettles of gigantic and primeval growth in the greenhouse disguised a thriving grape vine. I confess I was foolish enough to think of the eighteenth-century American women whose letters and diaries I read, many of whom were keen gardeners. These women’s politics – whether revolutionary or loyalist – often found articulation through the language of gardening, and they were fond of quoting that verse from the 4th chapter of Micah about sitting under one’s vine undisturbed. Whoa there! I’m getting historically carried away! Better get off down the allotment. . . .

hey, you . . .

. . . get off my cloud!

Well, now the pattern is at last nearing completion, I think I can show you my new hoodie — knit top down, with pleasing puffy sleeves, and a cloud pocket, inspired by the old BBC weather symbols. It is a hoodie to be worn in the summer and is (I hope) a little suggestive of that season: a pale blue sky, and a drifting cloud. If you’ve been reading my posts about making this hoodie, you’ll know that what I particularly love about it are its details: its sleeves, its pocket, its neat hems and facings, and (of course) its acres and acres of i-cord.

At first I tried to knit the pocket ‘blind’, just making up the cloudy shape as I went. But I soon realised that this would not work – on my first attempt I merely made a nice, mound shape, with some even nicer 3 stitch icord around it. After a few more (failed) attempts, I decided to do things by the book, and actually graphed out the angles and dimensions of the cloud in the original BBC weather symbols designed in 1974 by Mark Allen. Then I translated my maths into something knit at 6.5 stitches to the inch, and outlined it with a bold 5 st icord. Nifty! This is what I based my pocket on:

(© BBC)

And this is what it became.

Hurrah! I was very pleased with the cloud, and am also pleased with the pixie-style hood. This is picked up around the neck and shoulders after the rest of the sweater is complete. It lies nice and flat thanks to some neat facings (made in a similar manner to the way I describe here) and then the hood and front-neck are finished off together with (yes) a continuous icord bind off. The neckline sits nicely, though I do say so myself. Here is the hood from the back:

and – wait for it – from the front.

I fear I may be starting to resemble a cartoon character, but I’m seriously pleased with the end result — so really, who cares? Its worth saying now that in the final pattern the cloud pocket will be an optional extra, and that instructions for a more conventional kangaroo-style plain pouch pocket will be included. My prototype is made in (yes, you guessed it) my favourite Bowmont Braf , but I reckon it would work equally well in any robust 4 ply. Even though the gauge is fine, the top-down seamless stockinette makes for a relatively quick knit. In fact, the only thing that is time consuming is the finishing — and I reckon that is worth doing well. I’m now receiving some welcome and expert assistance test knitting a rather different prototype version, which I hope will give some sense of the different ways in which this hoodie might be knit. I am also pleased with the name (suggested by Tom and, um, Keith Richards) which evokes the cheesy 70s feel I was aiming for in the design. And I can already testify that it is good at what it was designed for– summer walking.

Well, I’ll get off my cloud for now – but I thought I’d let you know that a pattern is coming soonish, that the sweater will be available in 9 sizes to fit any chest from 24 to 44 inches with ease, and that I’m taking my time in order to get things just right.

Name: (Get off my) Cloud
Pattern: by me. Tis imminent.
Yarn: Bowmont Braf (or similar 4 ply / light sport weight that knits at 6.5 st to the inch).
Ravelled here.

PS I want to thank everyone for your allotment congrats. The elusive key has finally arrived. We are very excited. More soon.

ex terra lucem

I returned to Lancashire for the weekend, and went for a walk with my mum and dad.
We parked the car near the colliery gates. . .

. . .and we made our way over the landscape which covers the site of the mine. The trees thinned and the ground rose up before us.

Then this appeared, luminous among the weeds and rushes.

We went to get a better view.

Those of you who live in Lancashire, or who have been watching Channel 4’s Big Art Project will know that this is Dream, the arresting and very beautiful piece of public sculpture commissioned from Catalan artist, Jaume Plensa. Mining has been at the heart of St Helens for four hundred years until 1991, when Sutton Manor Colliery closed. A group of ex-miners nominated the colliery as the site of a new landmark work of art: a piece that they felt should not merely be commemorative or contemplative, but forward looking and inspirational. After conversations with the local community, Plensa designed a piece that is suggestive both of the “dream of light when you are working in darkness” and the old Victorian motto of the town, “ex terra lucem” (out of the earth comes light). The finished sculpture was unveiled on May 31st, and quietly sits above the landscape of Sutton Manor Community Forest, the focal point of a space that is emphatically for public use.

Dream is a child in sleep, her features smoothed away. But there’s a promise about her too that is more than a little discomfiting. Those eyelids might well flicker into life. What will she see if her eyes open? Will she rise up further from the earth?

When we were there, there were lots of people. Everyone spent time looking at the sculpture, and everyone seemed to want to touch it. Kids ran about, adults posed for photographs, lay on their backs in the sun, ate picnics. Several hundred thousand people have apparently already visited Dream since its unveiling on May 31st, and I’m very pleased to have been one of them. Local feeling about the sculpture is incredibly positive, though there have been a few sadly predictable complaints that Dream does not dominate the landscape enough to be seen from the motorway. There’s not much you can say to someone whose test of whether something is a landmark or not is its visibility from the M62, but why not actually stop your car, get out, and take a look? Why not walk the less than half a mile up over the old pit, through this great landscape that the forestry commission have now transformed? Why not sit on the steps around the base of Plensa’s Dream, and look back down on the amazing space of the North West all around you?

Dream stands twenty metres high but is not in the least monumental. It wears its status as a piece of public art quite lightly. The child’s face, the closed eyes, mean that there is an intimacy about it and the space in which it sits. This intimacy, and the way the work speaks back to the landscape of St Helens, means that the piece will not just be an end in itself, but will become the occasion of other dreams for this landscape. All good.

at last

an allotment is ours!