April 02, 2004
Color
I thought I would kick off this party with a post about color. After all, besides the yarn itself, that's the first thing you have to decide on. What color will suit you and give you just the look you want. Here's some pics of Calmer color cards to show what's available in this yarn line -- and to use as reference when someone introduces their color of choice for their Audrey.
Summer 2003 Calmer
Summer 2004 Calmer
I will leave it to others to talk about colors appropriate to the 50's Glam Woman, and instead share some information that I learned from one of my favorite knitting books -- Maggi Righetti's Sweater Design in Plain English. Even if you never want to design a sweater of your own, this book gives you lots of hints about how to make sure that you get the garment that's right for you. And whether in the 50's or in the 00's part of what makes a garment look excellent and glamorous is having it fit you in the right way.
One of my favorite parts of her book is how to select color. She explains that there are basically two types of skin -- skin with yellowish undertones and skin with redish or pink undertones. It's those undertones in your skin that determine how good certain colors will look next to them. To quote from her book directly:
"We usually look our best -- most vibrant and alive -- wearing the color that is OPPOSITE our underlying skin tone. If the underlying skin tone is sallow (yellowish), choose colors that have red in them. If the underlying skin tone is ruddy (red or pink), choose colors that have yellow in them."
When I read this passage in the book, I suddenly realized that I have yellowish undertones in my skin. Put something yellow next to my face and I will not look healthy and happy.
She also makes another point that I think is very interesting:
"It is interesting to note that almost everyone looks good in aqua-turquoise (a blue-green-white blend) and apricot-coral ( a red-yellow-white blend). If you do not know the underlying skin tone of the intended wearer, you can hardly go wrong with those two colors. Another intriguing fact is that few people look good in khaki and camel, both of which are devoid of red and yellow."
Finally, she also discusses the effect of warm and cool colors. Warm colors are in the earth tone range -- browns and reds and yellows and oranges and golds. Cool colors are sky tones -- blues and purples, reds tinted with blue, aqua. Warm and cool colors have different effects on your eyes. When you look at them, warm colors seem to expand, while cool colors seem to shrink. (If you want to try an interesting experiment, put different colors in similar size areas on a sheet of paper and see which ones look bigger to you).
And she provides two basic rules for the use of warm and cool colors:
"If you want to look larger, wear warm colors. If you want to look smaller, wear cool colors."
Of course, this is not an exhaustive discussion of color. Other things play into it -- your hair color, eye color, etc, all play a role.
I believe being glam very much means looking our most vibrant an alive. It also means accentuating our best features and minimizing those that we are less pleased with.
So knit-a-longers... here's your first assignment. You don't need yarn or needles to do it. Tell us what you think your ideal Audrey color would be. There's no right answer and you don't have to pick a color out of the Calmer range. You don't even have to pick a color that you actually bought for the garment. Just use your personal experience and visualize.
To get things rolling... here's mine:
I'm definitely a yellow undertone sort of girl. In spite of my wishes, I have never been able to wear yellow, orange, tomato reds or Shreky green. The colors that make me happiest, that I gravitate too while shopping are blues and purples and bluey greens. But blue makes me happiest. I love blue things, could live in Denim. I'm not quite an hourglass. I've got the hips, but not the bust for it. And I like to minimize my hips so that I can have a more balanced look. More support for a cool color. And the big kicker -- my eyes. I've got big blue ones. I think they're one of the nicest gifts my Dad ever gave me. And the right blue makes them shine. I'm definitely a cool blue girl. So it should come as no surprise that I'm making my Audrey in NightSky -- a deep cool denimy blue that Rowan discontinued for 2004.
Have a great weekend folks! And don't forget to do your homework!