Knitting -- Men Who Knit: Arne and Carlos

Arne and Carlos have a Youtube blog, mostly about Norwegian traditions, a lot of which have to do with knitting. They discuss brioche, but their description is a lot like the one from the 1892 Butterick book I told you about.

https://www.youtube.com/c/ARNECARLOS/videos

There is a huge amount of stuff on their site but although they have playlists, you'd have to go through all of them to find gems. I picked some out but it's worth your time to go through all of them.

Twined knitting hat. Watch this. It will drive you crazy at first if you are used to Fair Isle knitting, but you have to do it the way Arne does it. Make sure to go to minute 6:40 where he reverses the twist to get a fishbone effect on the inside. The outside looks the same. At minute 8:15 he starts showing decreases for the top.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zey5fQll6UQ

Pattern in purl hat. Arne uses the hold you are used to from Fair Isle, English on the main color and continental on the pattern color.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uVTDggeJwY

This is their video on reversible two-color knitting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cNh-rTc34k

Long-tail cast-on. Also known as slingshot cast on.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcvzB_9o8qc

I-cord cast-on using DP needles. Knowing this technique means you don't need to carry around ONE MORE GADGET so you can make an I-cord. I don't see a lot of point in I-cords and neither do Arne and Carlos. But they show you how to pick up both loops of the top stitches to start your fabric and they refer to joining the ends to work in the round.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_lQU5QsdNs

Yet another cast-on, the German twisted. It's too much like cat's cradle for my taste.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abHaswcSNGI

And the "tubular" cast-on, which is a lot like a one-needle version of the cast-on for the toe-up socks pattern I talked about long ago. The advantage is that the cast-on is practically invisible.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAH5vT_UIxc&list=PLElv_tSbHW3rwK8GSfGtRqUtOJJ14A9tp&index=2

Arne and Carlos also do the closed toe cast-on much like in that link above -- BUT WITHOUT CIRCULAR NEEDLES. I have tried multiple times to do that on DPs and it never worked. This will work so you're not always tugging a needle out. I'm definitely going to learn this one because, once again, it means you don't need one more tool before you can cast on a sock that you will knit on DPs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crMdybZVt3M

The next technique is called twisted rib and Arne and Carlos say they see it on very old sweaters. It is more elastic than your ordinary straight rib. Go to minute 1:49 to see how Arne does it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MuVk343imk

This is their video on brioche. They point out that when  you are not doing brioche in the round, it's the same two things every time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2zJadaVeRI

In another video Arne shows a pattern his grandmother used to make something for his grandfather. The pattern has her notes on it. It was named Dovre kofta but it is also known as Dovrefjell and when I googled with that term I got a pattern like this. The detail lets you see how to design your work.

This is a free pattern from Sandnes Garn:

https://www.sandnesgarn.no/dovrekoft

This is another pattern that came up, and the photo on Ravelry can give you an idea of how to reproduce it.

https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/dovrefjell-herre

It works for both women and men.

While they talked about this sock, Arne and Carlos explained that the heel and toe used "eye of partridge" stitch because it makes the toe and heel as thick as the rest of the sock. You wouldn't get that with stockinette. It's a thing; I found a second video on it and not from a Norwegian. Here's Arne and Carlos' video. Go to minute 4:20 to catch the beginning; the actual eye of partridge starts at 5:16.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUNfdBv14RY

Arne and Carlos design housewares and here is a video about knitted cushions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBxe3Vgr6GY

Here's a tutorial on intarsia. Once you grasp the technique you'll be able to design your own.

https://tkga.org/wp-content/uploads/issue_archives/2009/Intarsia%20Pillow%20Lesson.pdf

So go to town with this site and get some new ideas. Or rather, old ideas, but things you didn't know about. My nephew-in-law says his Norwegian mother loves this site, so this is not one of your faux ethnic things adopted for bragging rights, it's the real deal.