July 2009 Archives
You may have noticed that I have not, shall we say, been a consistent blogger. Of the long, long list of things that need to be accomplished to keep Sundara Yarn running, posting to this blog has not been a huge priority. But I have been thinking of it and wanting to get it going again. My problem has been that when I conceived of this blog, I was in a very different place, both with the yarn and, well, everything else in my life. I've struggled with the focus of this blog.
Desert Sunrise was a colorway I developed probably a year and a half ago, but Mikaela and I lost the dye codes* and it took us about a year to get around to figuring out what I had used originally. I also had to hold off on the color because it was somewhat similar to Honeyed Hibiscus, which is what the Spring Seasons got for the Silk Lace mailing in 2008 and I try to not be repetitive for any one season within the color spectrum.
Ginger over Peach was a tough color to name. We tried variations on citrus, chamomile, melon, but none of them seemed quite right. I'm not sure if Ginger over Peach totally captures the colorway, but it is close enough. The other thing about this colorway was I had originally planned to do some sort of goldish color over a robin's egg for the second spring color, but I could not get it right. And I tried for weeks and weeks. I finally decided that colorway was not meant to be so I randomly tried a bunch of color ideas and Ginger over Peach made the cut.
Summer: Under the Sea and Coral Reef
Under the Sea was the first color I came up with for Summer. I got it right on the first try, which is always a happy event. I couldn't get the Under the Sea name out of my head, although everyone else thought we should name it something less marine-oriented. Then when I came up with Coral Reef colorway, we named it almost immediately and I decided that Under the Sea was what we would use so we'd have a sort of aquatic theme to Summer.
I was a bit concerned about the orange-ish-ness to Coral Reef, since Summer usually gets more cooler toned yarns. But the colorway captured the hot, intense, brightness that summer sometimes has and I felt like with previous Summer Seasons, I'd gone through most of the color spectrum in the intense and saturated colors and besides, I just love the pinky-coral brightness of this colorway.
Autumn: Burnt Caramel and End of Day
Like Desert Sunrise, I came up with both of these colorways about a year and a half ago and have been saving them for the perfect time. I couldn't use them in the 2008-2009 Seasons Collection because they were too close to Mahogany over Marmalade and Arabian Nights. Or at least in the same vein. I still remember when I came up with End of Day, as it immediately became one of my favorite colorways because it is a color I can wear well. I don't actually have favorite colorways, since I don't judge my colorways in that sort of way, but I do have favorites in that I can wear those colors. I named it after a line in an Iron and Wine song, "Innocent Bones", "that the burning man is the color of the end of day, and how every tongue that gets bit always has another word to say."
Burnt Caramel was also hard to name, since some of the skeins have a bit of purple in them that was difficult to account for in the name. I had wanted a sort of espresso over caramel color, which I think I succeeded in coming up with overall. We ended up deciding to ignore the purple bits and go with the tasty name.
Winter: Lunar Landing and Cranberry Chutney
Lunar Landing was a color I tried out for the 2008-2009 Seasons Collection for Autumn and it was most definitely not Autumn and most definitely a winter. I love the strange beauty of the colorway. But we already had all our winter colors so I held it for this last round. Some of you may have noticed my love of alliteration when naming yarn or when naming just about anything. I'd speak in alliteration if I could. Cranberry Chutney was another colorway I came up with ages ago, but I knew I wanted to do a black cherry color for the 2008-2009 Seasons Collection as the Winter red color, so again, it got held. You should see the stack of unreleased colorways I've got just waiting for the perfect use, but that is a story for another blog posting.
So that sums up the Seasons. I'm very glad to be done with coming up with colorways that fit into the constraints of the four Seasons. It was a very fun experience and I spent a lot of time looking at the colors all around me throughout the year. What I learned was how much repetition in colors there are, not just in each season, but all year long. It forced me to be creative within all of the constraints of the four seasons. But at some point you run up against the slight nuances of color that can't be adequately conveyed as color on yarn and so the Seasons ran its course and I'm on to new challenges.
*dye codes are the recipe we use to dye Permanent Collection yarn.
It's had a bit of an identity crisis, which, I guess in some way reflects the changes in my identity as I've grown into a much different role as Sundara Yarn has expanded and grown by leaps and bounds. But what has always interested me and continues to be the main focus of my job is color. So that is what I'm going to try to make this blog about. I have no idea what shape or form this will take or how I'm going to go about doing it. But I'm good at jumping into things and finding my way through it as I go, so that is what I'll do.
I'll probably at some point change the look and feel and maybe even the name of the blog to better represent what it is to me. I'd like to do that now, but my intrepid web developer is off photographing dogs and cats and weddings. Which is absolutely what she should be doing, since she is utterly fantastic at it, so in the mean time, I'll just leave everything as is.
So to start off! Whenever we did a Seasons Collection mailing, I always had a few things about the colors that I wanted to communicate, but never got around to it. Since we did our last Seasons Collection mailing a month or so ago, I figure this is my last chance.
First up, Spring: Desert Sunrise and Ginger over Peach.
Desert Sunrise was a colorway I developed probably a year and a half ago, but Mikaela and I lost the dye codes* and it took us about a year to get around to figuring out what I had used originally. I also had to hold off on the color because it was somewhat similar to Honeyed Hibiscus, which is what the Spring Seasons got for the Silk Lace mailing in 2008 and I try to not be repetitive for any one season within the color spectrum.Ginger over Peach was a tough color to name. We tried variations on citrus, chamomile, melon, but none of them seemed quite right. I'm not sure if Ginger over Peach totally captures the colorway, but it is close enough. The other thing about this colorway was I had originally planned to do some sort of goldish color over a robin's egg for the second spring color, but I could not get it right. And I tried for weeks and weeks. I finally decided that colorway was not meant to be so I randomly tried a bunch of color ideas and Ginger over Peach made the cut.
Summer: Under the Sea and Coral Reef
Under the Sea was the first color I came up with for Summer. I got it right on the first try, which is always a happy event. I couldn't get the Under the Sea name out of my head, although everyone else thought we should name it something less marine-oriented. Then when I came up with Coral Reef colorway, we named it almost immediately and I decided that Under the Sea was what we would use so we'd have a sort of aquatic theme to Summer.
I was a bit concerned about the orange-ish-ness to Coral Reef, since Summer usually gets more cooler toned yarns. But the colorway captured the hot, intense, brightness that summer sometimes has and I felt like with previous Summer Seasons, I'd gone through most of the color spectrum in the intense and saturated colors and besides, I just love the pinky-coral brightness of this colorway.
Autumn: Burnt Caramel and End of Day
Like Desert Sunrise, I came up with both of these colorways about a year and a half ago and have been saving them for the perfect time. I couldn't use them in the 2008-2009 Seasons Collection because they were too close to Mahogany over Marmalade and Arabian Nights. Or at least in the same vein. I still remember when I came up with End of Day, as it immediately became one of my favorite colorways because it is a color I can wear well. I don't actually have favorite colorways, since I don't judge my colorways in that sort of way, but I do have favorites in that I can wear those colors. I named it after a line in an Iron and Wine song, "Innocent Bones", "that the burning man is the color of the end of day, and how every tongue that gets bit always has another word to say."Burnt Caramel was also hard to name, since some of the skeins have a bit of purple in them that was difficult to account for in the name. I had wanted a sort of espresso over caramel color, which I think I succeeded in coming up with overall. We ended up deciding to ignore the purple bits and go with the tasty name.
Winter: Lunar Landing and Cranberry Chutney
Lunar Landing was a color I tried out for the 2008-2009 Seasons Collection for Autumn and it was most definitely not Autumn and most definitely a winter. I love the strange beauty of the colorway. But we already had all our winter colors so I held it for this last round. Some of you may have noticed my love of alliteration when naming yarn or when naming just about anything. I'd speak in alliteration if I could. Cranberry Chutney was another colorway I came up with ages ago, but I knew I wanted to do a black cherry color for the 2008-2009 Seasons Collection as the Winter red color, so again, it got held. You should see the stack of unreleased colorways I've got just waiting for the perfect use, but that is a story for another blog posting. So that sums up the Seasons. I'm very glad to be done with coming up with colorways that fit into the constraints of the four Seasons. It was a very fun experience and I spent a lot of time looking at the colors all around me throughout the year. What I learned was how much repetition in colors there are, not just in each season, but all year long. It forced me to be creative within all of the constraints of the four seasons. But at some point you run up against the slight nuances of color that can't be adequately conveyed as color on yarn and so the Seasons ran its course and I'm on to new challenges.
*dye codes are the recipe we use to dye Permanent Collection yarn.
