54 Rue du Chateau A collaborative, progressive shawl project by Mary-Heather Browne Olga Buraya-Kefelian Amy Christoffers Bristol Ivy Leila Raabe and
Michele Wang
featuring yarns from A Verb for Keeping Warm
In the first quarter of the 20th century, a group of friends in France created a game called Exquisite Corpse. In its many forms, Exquisite Corpse is about the unexpected: participants write part of a sentence or draw part of a sketch, then fold the paper so that their work is almost completely concealed and hand it to the next person. That person, working solely from the small part of the sentence or image that they can see, continues the work in their own style. It is an emblem of the Surrealist movement, as the resultant sentences and sketches are the children of many different players and many different styles. It can lead the participants to expand their perception of what is possible in their craft. I grew up playing Exquisite Corpse in both art and writing classes. As an admitted perfectionist, it was often (and is still often) hard to let go of what the finished product would look like, but the game never failed to help me see things in a new light or explore possibilities I had never considered. I don’t remember what made me think of trying it with knitting. Leila and I had loose plans to trade a shawl back and forth over the course of the summer of 2013, and I was excited to use this opportunity to push my typical ideas of knitting. But then, I reasoned, wouldn’t it be better to have two shawls, so that we could each have one to keep at the end? And then, I thought, there was no reason that the circle of trading couldn’t expand even further. . . and 54 Rue du Chateau began. I am eternally humbled and thrilled that the knitting community is so up for ideas of “what if?” Michele, Olga, Amy, and Mary-Heather all came on board within 24 hours of the original idea, and the amazing A Verb for Keeping Warm agreed to support us with their gorgeous yarn shortly thereafter. A few short months later, the yarn shipped out, and the journey began. Here was the plan: each designer would start a shawl, knitting 20 rows in the yarn and pattern of their choice over the course of a month. They’d slide their stitches onto waste yarn and send the shawl to the next designer, who had a month to add their twenty rows. This would continue, round-robin style, until all designers had knit a section on each other’s shawls. No one designer knit the same section twice, nor was preceded by or preceded the same designer twice.
After all the designers had worked on the shawl, it returned to its original designer, who added the final border (which, of all the sections, held no constraints on the number of rows or stitch count) and bound off. It was then that we all got to see the whole picture for the first time--the shawl that had left our hands many months previous was now complete in a truly collaborative way. The thing that has intrigued me most about this project is that, though the original designer only had those few scant rows with which to set the tone, the resulting projects are so indicative of her own style. MaryHeather’s Breton is classic, with quirky, intuitive twists. Leila’s Duchamp illustrates her love of texture, exploring the bounds of ribbing and eyelets as the lines travel across the fabric. Olga’s Peret is pure geometry: mesh and stockinette shift and move to create unexpected and graphic shapes in the negative space. Michele’s Prevert is a perfect mix of feminine details and minimalist architecture. Amy’s Reverdy combines her love of deep, rustic garter stitch with soft, organic lace. And my own Tanguy is all about shifting lines and Art Deco influences. They are all wildly different, despite the fact that we each knit on every single one. And that is maybe the best part of this whole project. We decided to name the collection after the place at which Exquisite Corpse was invented, 54 Rue du Chateau, and each shawl for one of the six innovators of the game: Andre Breton, Marcel Duchamp, Benjamin Peret, Jacques Prevert, Pierre Reverdy, and Yves Tanguy. We hope they, and you, appreciate this new application of their classic game!
- Bristol p.s. oh, and did I mention? Due to the set number of stitches and rows in each section, the charts are interchangeable across the shawls. So Chart C in Tanguy can sub for Chart C in Prevert, which can sub for Chart C in Duchamp, and so on. . . right around 280,000 possible combinations. I’m sure the Surrealists would approve!
Breton
designed by, in order:
Mary-Heather Browne Amy Christoffers Olga Buraya-Kefelian Leila Raabe Michele Wang and Bristol Ivy
in A Verb for Keeping Warm
Creating
in the colorway
Indigo Blue Sky
Duchamp
designed by, in order:
Leila Raabe Bristol Ivy Amy Christoffers Michele Wang Mary-Heather Browne and Olga Buraya-Kefelian
in A Verb for Keeping Warm
Annapurna
in the colorway
Jade
Peret
designed by, in order:
Olga Buraya-Kefelian Mary-Heather Browne Michele Wang Amy Christoffers Bristol Ivy and Leila Raabe
in A Verb for Keeping Warm
Annapurna
in the
colorway
Supernova
Prevert
designed by, in order:
Michele Wang Olga Buraya-Kefelian Bristol Ivy Mary-Heather Browne Leila Raabe and Amy Christoffers
in A Verb for Keeping Warm
Annapurna
in the colorway
Hawk's Feather
Reverdy
designed by, in order:
Amy Christoffers Leila Raabe Mary-Heather Browne Bristol Ivy Olga Buraya-Kefelian and Michele Wang
in A Verb for Keeping Warm
Annapurna
in the colorway
Old Vine
Tanguy
designed by, in order:
Bristol Ivy Michele Wang Leila Raabe Olga Buraya-Kefelian Amy Christoffers and Mary-Heather Browne
in A Verb for Keeping Warm
Floating
in the colorway
Topological
Olga Buraya-Kefelian www.olgajazzy.com
Bristol Ivy
www.blackbirdturning.blogspot.com
Mary-Heather Browne
Leila Raabe
www.rainydaygoods.com
www.leilaknits.com
Amy Christoffers
Michele Wang
www.savoryknitting.com
www.mishi2x.com
yarns by A Verb for Keeping Warm www.averbforkeepingwarm.com
Photos, charts, and layout by Bristol Ivy and Leila Raabe Tech editing by Dawn Catanzaro Modeled by Dana Fadel shot on location on Wharf Street, Portland, ME