Wrap yourself in this stunning filet-crochet kimono made with Manos Del Uruguay Silk Blend and featured in the September/October 2017 issue of PieceWork. Robyn Chachula used the Rose and Lily motif from a wallpaper design by John Henry Dearle, assistant to William Morris, for her pattern. Here’s Robyn to explain more about her filet-crochet design.
The idea of reimagining the Arts and Crafts Movement in our time was the inspiration behind this modern filet-crochet shawl. Much as John Henry Dearle, assistant to William Morris, was inspired by seventeenth-century Italian designs and reinvented them for some of his work for Morris and Company, I took Dearle’s popular Rose and Lily wallpaper design and reinvented it for our time.
Robyn Chachula's stunning shawl, worked in filet crochet with a silk/wool blend yarn, will be the go-to accessory to wear with jeans or a favorite cocktail dress. Photo by George Boe.
This rectangular shawl stays true to classic filet crochet, using void and filled spaces to create a pattern. The modern invention is all in the material: a wonderfully vibrant silk-blend yarn. The resulting project moves and drapes. Named after William Morris’s first daughter, Jane Alice, I like to imagine a modern young version of her wearing this shawl with jeans to the local flower market.
—Robyn Chachula
Robyn Chachula is the author of Vintage Modern Crochet: Classic Crochet Lace Techniques for Contemporary Style, Blueprint Crochet Sweaters: Techniques for Custom Construction, Unexpected Afghans: Innovative Crochet Designs with Traditional Techniques (Loveland, Colorado: Interweave, 2016, 2013, and 2012, respectively), and Crochet Stitches Visual Encyclopedia (Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley, 2011). Her work has been featured in Interweave Crochet, Love of Crochet, Vogue Crochet, Crochet!, and more. She has a number of crochet workshops at both Interweave.com and www.anniescatalogue.com. She is one of the crochet experts on the PBS show Knit and Crochet Now! All of her crochet inspiration comes from her little “office assistants” while out and about in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Stop by www.crochetbyfaye.com to see what she has cooked up recently.
Download a copy of in the September/October 2017 issue of PieceWork, and make Robyn Chachula's “Jane Alice Kimono Shawl to Crochet.” Plus the issue includes five additional projects to embroider, knit, and felt, such as the stylish Peacock Slippers.