A lot has been going on here for the past few months and it’s about time we announce the changes that we have been working on and talk about the things that we want to do in the future, especially when it comes to our social media platforms and most importantly: the way we interact with you!
Since we are only posting very sporadically on Instagram and Facebook nowadays, we have decided to become more active here on this blog and we will make sure to post updates on all the things that are going on around here, hopefully on a weekly basis. This will compensate for our absence on the other platforms, so make sure to subscribe to our updates or check in on the blog regularly from now, to find out what we are up to! You will also notice, if you look at the bottom of this post, that we have now opened for comments on our blog posts. This is something that we have been thinking about doing for a long time and finally we got it done! So, from now on, you can also leave a reply to our posts here on the blog and we hope that this will make the experience on this platform more interactive, as we intend to follow up and reply to as many comments as we can. We want to encourage you to comment on our blog posts and give us your feedback, as we really want to hear from you!
Let’s talk about what we have been up to lately: April at the Studio.
Now, to our weekly update, which, for the first time is going to be a monthly update, as we do have some catching up to do!
April was a quiet but busy month for us. We have been in Norway all the time, working at our studio and will continue to do so for the next few weeks, as we have some design projects that we are working on at the moment and which we need to wrap up. We don’t think we have ever explained to you how long ahead in time we actually work, but currently, we are designing collections for Spring/Summer 2020 and will hopefully have everything finalised by May 15th. Then, after we return from our Knitting Under the Midnight Sun Cruise on June 3rd, we will start our work for Autumn/Winter 2020 and also start thinking about Spring/Summer 2021. Designing knitwear for a brand like Rowan or developing sock yarns for Regia is a process that takes a long time and we will be writing more about our timelines in the coming updates, so that you get a better understanding of what the life of full-time designers really looks like.
Working on some new designs. Do you see anything on Carlos’ desk that catches your interest? Let us know in the comments.
Easter came late this year and we decided, for the first time since 2015, to take the entire Easter week off, and enjoyed some fabulous, warm and sunny weather up in the high mountains in Jotunheimen, which is very close to where we live. We were also able to spend some time with our family as well, which was lovely. So, we feel totally refreshed and ready to finish up on our projects! Now, the snow has melted completely and we have also started to tidy up our garden and prepare it for the season. In the next few weeks, things will start to grow very quickly and by the end of May, we will have an explosion of greenery and flowers! It’s always an exciting and fun time for us. This year, we have big plans to start making a new kitchen garden and the work to renovate the old warehouse, which will eventually become our new studio, will also resume again this summer. We will write more about the renovation and the new kitchen garden as the season progresses. And we will be doing updates from our garden as well as composting with Bokashi on YouTube this summer, so stay tuned!
Snow is gone and it’s time to get the garden ready! Freja is there to help, as always.
Our Final Thoughts on Raising Pattern Prices:
We know about the discussions on pricing that have been going on in the knitting community lately, about people wanting to raise their pattern prices considerably, in order to cover their costs. We just wanted you to know that we are very happy charging our current prices ($6 for small accessories, $7 – $ 8 for larger designs that include things like complex charts or grading ) and have no intention of raising them. And on the subject of inclusivity, our YouTube channel is for everyone to enjoy and will always continue to be 100% free of charge. Also, for those of you who are not aware: We have published around 100 free patterns on our blog that support the free tutorials that we have on YouTube. Everyone is welcome to use these patterns and we really hope you will enjoy making some of those projects! We did start to charge for new patterns from January 2019 and have now finally opened our own online shop, but even if we intend to sell patterns through our online shop, we will still continue to post a free pattern from time to time.
We wish you a great week ahead!
ARNE & CARLOS
Calendar of events (click on links for more info)
May 28th – June 3rd, 2019: “Knitting Under the Midnight Sun”. Cruise along the stunning Norwegian coast together with us. Due to a cancellation, we still have 1 cabin available. More information is available here.
August 15th – 19th, 2019: Tour some of Britain’s most stunning gardens together with us. In addition to visiting some seriously beautiful gardens in the Cotswolds, we have tickets to Prince Charles’ Garden at his private residence, Highgrove. These tickets are almost impossible to come by, so this is a unique chance! There are still a few spots available. We are SO excited about this trip!! More information is available here.
March 3rd – 9th, 2020: “Knitting under the Northern Lights”. Cruise along the stunning Norwegian coast together with us. We just opened this cruise for registration and half of the spots are already gone. We expect it to sell out very soon. More information is available here.