Wow, this is dangerous!
Via Knitter’s Review, KnitPicks.com, an amazing source for reasonably priced, quality yarns and accessories. If you love natural fiber yarns as much as I do, this is the site for you!
What’s really cool is their yarn finding system. Input some information about what you need (yarn for a sweater? what color? who are you knitting it for?) and it returns appropriate recommendations.
I’m eyeing some Andean Silk in “Lettuce” right now…
And while we’re at it, their COLORS are amazing. None of this obnoxious Rainbow Brite stuff. (Oooh boy, I just dated myself as a child of the 1980s right there, didn’t I?) But I will admit I am prejudiced against many novelty yarns just because their colors are so…”plastic-y”.
Free shipping over $30, too? How am I going to be able to restrain myself now? Clara, what have you done? I should have never opened that email from Knitter’s Review! Ok, ok, only kidding. But this website is definitely going on my “danger, Will Robinson!” list!
Yeah, I am having a hard time with this one as well. I keep telling myself I will budget my yarn, but geez, budgeting myself for 30.00 worth of yarn would go pretty far at this webstite.
There has been a lot of talk about this yarn on some other online groups, so I am glad to see an actual review. I know a number of people were irked over the yardage error on the Andean Silk, some of the folks were pleased with the site’s response–they were shipped free yarn–but other people felt they were getting the runaround when they contacted the site. And it did seem to be taking them awhile to correct the error, but it does say 96 yards now.
Must. Not. Buy. Yarn.
I just finished a sweater vest using the Andean Silk. In many ways it is very nice but there are a few things to keep in mind, from my experience.
1. The ends do not stay woven in well. (I had a lot because of stripes.)
2. The Knitter’s Review article talks about problems with silk slubs in the yarn but I counted only one of these during the entire project–which took ten balls of the yarn.
3. Their manufacturing process involves a highly sneaky way to hide knots in the yarn, where the loose ends are twisted very tightly around the strand to bind them together. You really don’t see it until it’s right there about to be stitched, and then once you make the stitch you have a stiff bar where that twisty knot is. I would rather they just tie little regular knots, so at least you have a bit more warning. This type of knot can’t hardly even be undone–you have to cut it.
I also succumbed to their prices…even with exchange and shipping costs to Canada, can’t beat them! I have some merino on the way in hollyberry…hope to make a garment out of it…we’ll see how it knits up.