History on Two Needles is a labor of love for me.
I wanted to create garments inspired by historic images, without becoming historic costumes. My love of historic garment silhouette, detail, and the lessons these teach us about political changes in the world is something I like to bring to my hand knit designs whenever possible.
For years I dreamed about a collection of designs based on iconic works from art history, blending several of my great loves (knitting, history and art) into one set of finished patterns that anyone could knit and wear.
My Master’s Degree is in Costume & Set Design (I generally call this my “$20,000 degree in folding.”) Earning that degree allowed me to indulge my great love of history, clothing and hone the craft of telling a story through style.
After working as an Assistant Designer and Milliner on Broadway and designing a few shows Off Broadway, I spent a bit of time working in wardrobe and set decoration for TV before returning to my hand knit design roots in 2000.
My work in costume design introduced me to many inspiring pieces of art, images of which I filed away to ‘do something with’ someday. I’ve used many of these as inspiration for the hand knit designs that fill History on Two Needles.
But actually getting the designs worked up, knitted, charted and published has proven harder than with any other book I’ve written. This has been a project with many different parts; image licensing, historical research, reworking of a pattern until it reflect exactly the silhouette and feeling I want – it’s been a long, long road.
I’ve tried to include a wide range of sizes for all the garments, although in some cases the size of the repeat determines how many sizes I could accommodate.
I admit that the images referenced have an English bias, a reflection of my own love of Great Britain and its history.
The models and backgrounds were shot separately and married together with the aid of Photoshop.
Perhaps one day I’ll have the budget for a round-the-world photo shoot with a full compliment of stylists and models, but until that time I have my own travel photographs and wonderful Minnesota Models to wear my clothing!
