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Want to know Meg Swansen’s best colorwork tip? We did, too!
Debbie Blair6 min read
In my knitting life, I’ve only made a few projects with stranded colorwork knitting. Maybe it’s that I enjoy sitting down with relaxing stockinette, or maybe I’m a little intimidated. But I am so inspired by the Fall 2025 issue of Farm & Fiber Knits that I’ve been hunting for great resources for colorwork knitting.
I thought you might be looking, too, so I reached out to a handful of remarkable knitters famous for their colorwork to ask them two questions: What do you love about colorwork? And, What’s your best tip for colorwork?
Author of Knitting with Two Colors: Techniques for Stranded Knitting and Designing Color-Patterned Garments and publisher of many amazing colorwork resources through Schoolhouse Press
Meg Swansen and her book on colorwork, Knitting with Two Colors, which is currently available in digital format only. Photos courtesy of Schoolhouse Press
What does Meg love the most about colorwork knitting? “Since I knit color patterns only in the round, a geometric motif provides a soothing and sometimes hypnotic rhythm, which may turn into a kind of song. If, for instance, you are knitting a typical OXO Fair Isle pattern, you quickly learn the tune of the round, and needn’t look at the chart. As OXO’s repeat, you recognize a familiar tune from several inches ago and can comfortably settle back into the rhythm.
“However, when knitting a ‘picture’ pattern [like a sheep motif, for example] in regular color knitting (or trapping in the Armenian knitting technique), there are no rhythmical repeats, and no round is ever repeated. For this type of knitting, rather than soothed, I become riveted, and eagerly watch as the picture emerges from my needles.”
I was taught to knit by holding the working wool over my left index finger. Later, when I launched into two-color knitting, my mum showed me how to hold the second color in my right hand, and keep the two balls of wool on each side of me to prevent tangling. My right hand was never quite as clever as my left, but it worked well for many years.
Decades ago, [at Schoolhouse Press], we began to import the Swedish book BINGE. The cover showed a woman knitting with both wools over her left index finger. Intrigued, I practiced that for weeks, but when knitting 3–5 stitches with one color, I could not control the tension of the second strand. One day—when I wasn’t paying any particular attention—my hands (on their own volition) switched the second color to my left middle finger, and voilà, my tension difficulty was solved. I have knitted two-colors in that mode ever since.
I never make knots in my knitting, so, when joining or ending a new color, I simply leave a 3–5" tail to be darned in later. Those beginning and ending tails are very useful for defeating the “jog” in, for instance, a seamless yoke pattern where there is no place to hide (I shift the beginning of the round to behind the left shoulder). If you darn in the beginning tail diagonally up and to the right, and darn the ending tail down and to the left, you can align the stitches of each of those rounds to each other.
If the two colors are close in shade, you can spit-splice them. And I always spit-splice when joining in a matching new ball of wool. Actually, for my all-over patterned Turkish Maple, in which multiple (similar) colors change frequently throughout the pullover, I spit-spliced each new join. The extra time it took was worth the effort because when the body was finished, I had only the cast-on and the cast-off ends to darn in.
Author of many colorwork books, including 150 Scandinavian Motifs: The Knitter’s Directory, Fair Isle Style, and 200 Fair Isle Motifs
Mary Jane Mucklestone shown with one of the colorwork books she has authored. Designer photo courtesy of Mary Jane Mucklestone; cover by Interweave Press
I asked Mary Jane what her favorite thing is about colorwork knitting. “The colors! I can’t get enough of playing with colors. Before I started knitting, I worked next door to a yarn shop and I’d just go in and stare at the wall of colors. I am still endlessly entertained by messing around with balls of yarn, sorting them, and comparing them—gazing at them lovingly! The real fun begins with the knitting. Using them in different combinations can reveal delightful and unexpected outcomes.”
A hat is my favorite beginner project. I use hats as large swatches, both for choosing colors and for gauge. A hat will always fit someone. Swatchtastic Hat, from my book Grand Shetland Adventure Knits (with Gudrun Johnston), is designed as a template for testing out your color choices and your gauge for both stranded knitting and plain stockinette.
I think swatching is your best route to choosing colors that you’ll be happy with in your finished project. If you’re a beginner, focus on having enough contrast in value between your pattern colors (i.e. stars, flowers, or geometric shapes) and your background colors. Try collecting a group of light colors and a group of dark colors, then swatch to find the arrangement you like best—you may find you prefer the dark colors for the pattern motif instead of the lights—only swatching will tell.
Every swatch teaches you something, even the ones you consider failures, because they save you time and effort before launching into the full garment. Plus, it’s fun! I love to swatch.
Knitwear designer, including the Amplitude Pullover on the cover of Fall 2025 Farm & Fiber Knits
Julia Farwell-Clay designed the cover sweater for the Fall 2025 issue of Farm & Fiber Knits. Designer photo courtesy of Julia Farwell-Clay; cover image by Gale Zucker
What does Julia enjoy most when knitting colorwork? “My favorite thing about colorwork is watching the pattern build as I work through the chart. I find it really motivating to get just one more row in! I also love color, so putting several colors together feels really satisfying.”
My best tip for stranded work has to do with controlling tension. I often hear of knitters who try to fix tension issues by using a larger needle, but to me, that can only change the size of the stitches, not the floats, which is where the issue needs to be solved. As I work across the row, I make sure that every time I switch colors, the float for the new color is more than long enough to make the leap since the previous time it was used in a stitch.
I do that by gently stretching the stitches on the needle away from the needle tip, and I match the float to that expanded width before I make the first stitch in the new color. It might feel at first like the elongated float is too long, but it works out to be perfect in the final fabric. And with practice, that stretch becomes a fluid part of the knitting.
Shown left to right: Skellister Vest (Farm & Fiber Knits Fall 2025 issue), Homelands Hat (Farm & Fiber Knits digital collection), Identity Cowl (Farm & Fiber Knits Premier issue, Fall 2024); photos by Gale Zucker
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