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Sunday, September 1, 2013

Retro-Beading

Lady Windemere's Fan needed beads on that scalloped edge. Trouble was, again, the garnets had too small a hole for even my finest gauge crochet hook.  Plus, this design took a lot of knit-and-rip, knit-and-rip to get it right. Who wanted to mess with beads under those conditions?

But still, the finished garment called out for garnets. They were a Victorian favorite, after all; they do suit the color of the yarn ("Chocolate" Sea Silk by Handmaiden), quite well; they would add to the drape of this eminently drapeable shawl, I knew.

So I unwound a few feet of fine monofilament fishing line and I loaded that line with every garnet in my stash. Several knots in the loose end of the line anchored it to the right corner of the shawl; then it was a matter of lashing the loaded end at the proper intervals (two wraps, a bead, and two more wraps for each bottom loop of each scallop) and knotting off the final end at the left corner.

It's an almost invisible solution that saved the day.