PROFILE: AMANDA PERKINS
Amanda Perkins crocheted blankets to showcase her vivid yarns before her designs took on a life of their own. We discover her brilliant life.
Becoming addicted to the process and beauty of yarn dyeing was a ‘eureka moment’ for crochet designer Amanda Perkins. It all started with a bit of hand dyeing that ended up becoming a yarn company in 2001. “I became hooked very early on and dyed far too much yarn for me to use, so put some up for sale on eBay. It sold like hot cakes and The Natural Dye Studio was born,” Amanda explains.
With so much self-dyed yarn at her fingertips, the next step was to devise her own crochet creations. “I started designing patterns as pattern support for The Natural Dye Studio yarn,” she recalls, in what was the obvious next step in a life that had long been dedicated to crochet. “My Granny taught me to crochet when I was so small that I don’t remember learning. It feels as though crochet is something I’ve always been able to do.”
Much as she loved dabbling with different colours and dyes, demand for her patterns meant that Amanda had to close the studio in order to focus fully on coming up with new crochet designs. “My designs sold so well that my patterns stopped being pattern support for my yarn and my yarn turned into yarn support for my patterns,” she says. Running the business with her daughter Daisy, Amanda was also immersed in writing her book Rainbow Crocheted Blankets, which was swallowing acres of time. “We just couldn’t cope with the workload,” she says. “We were both constantly exhausted and arguing with each other. I decided that it was time to close Natural Dye Studio as it was far more important to have a good relation ship with my daughter, plus I needed to dedicate my time to concentrating on the book.”
A FOCUS ON DESIGN
When it comes to gathering ideas for her popular designs, Amanda says that she doesn’t really use any tools. “Instead, I spend a lot of time experimenting with shape and colour on Photoshop. I guess you could call it sketching.” The online world also feeds Amanda’s thirst for image and colour. “I follow a lot of talented designers on Instagram,” she says. “I’m also a Pinterest addict and have to limit my time on it. I definitely prefer visual to written.”
From the vibrancy of Amanda’s blankets, it’s clear that she has an innate penchant for colour. “I don’t really think about it – it’s just there – but I do get really excited if I see a colour combination I haven’t previously discovered,” she says. “I love to see all the colours together at the same time, like tubes of paint in art shops, paint charts and so on.”
Amanda’s days have developed a pleasing rhythm we can’t help but envy a little. “I spend the mornings in my wool room working on designs and admin, surrounded by shelves of yarn and pin boards with swatches and pictures,” she says. “The crochet part of the day is spent on my sofa in the living room with my dogs and the TV on in the background. The walls are white and the room quite minimalistic – the only other thing it contains is a set of bookshelves. I like it that way as it focuses my concentration on the colours and design that I’m making.”
THE SCHOOL OF ART
A background in art has helped to shape Amanda’s design preferences, while her home on Exmoor in south-west England is possibly the biggest influence on her output. Each of her creations sizzles with shade combinations chosen for the impact they have when placed side by side. It’s a powerful effect.
“I think art college taught me to look at the world in more depth and not be afraid to experiment,” Amanda says. “I’m normally inspired by the colours of the landscape and small snippets of time in my life, such as my ‘Cote de Lynmouth’ blanket.”
The text accompanying the blanket pattern says: “When I was a teenager, my parents had a house in the south of France on the Côte d’Azur. I live on Exmoor, high on a sea cliff overlooking the small seaside village of Lynmouth. On a sunny summer’s day when the temperature is hot, the sea is turquoise and the palm trees are gently swaying in the wind, Lynmouth feels like I am back in the south of France again.” It’s a nostalgic idea, crossing eras and geography.
It’s no surprise, then, to learn that blankets are a perfect showcase for these designs, inspired by nature. “I love designing and crocheting blankets because they give me a big flat canvas to work on, which enables me to focus on colour and shape,” she explains. “I don’t design or crochet anything else.”
MAKING AND DOING
Amanda prefers high quality yarns, as you’d expect given her background as a yarn wrangler herself, only using natural fibres. “I mainly work with two yarn companies: Fyberspates (www.fyberspates.com) and John Arbon Textiles (www.jarbon.com), which are run by friends from my Natural Dye Studio days,” she says. “My favourite yarns at the moment are Scrumptious 4ply by Fyberspates and Devonia 4ply by John Arbon Textiles, but I also love DROPS Alpaca and use Cascade 220 fingering as it has a huge palette I can work with.“
Crochet itself is, for Amanda, a fairly instinctive process. “I make motifs, which I think of as jigsaw pieces,” she says. “I can use lots of colours in the same motif, enabling me to create movement of colour in a blanket.”
The trick, she says, is to not be afraid of mistakes, which she readily admits to making. “All my blankets have motif mistakes hidden somewhere. They normally become apparent on the last round, so I tend to fudge the number of stitches. If a design or colour isn’t working, I frog or pin it on my swatch board and start again. It’s important to accept that there will be mistakes and that they’re not the end of the world.”
It’s this enthusiasm and unflappability that has equipped Amanda to create such a dazzlingly appealing library of patterns for colourful blankets that will bring beauty to any home. It’s also the reason why Amanda’s website isn’t necessarily all that straightforward to find. “My website’s URL is www.amandasperkinscrochetblankets.com. Notice anything strange? Please note the extra ‘s’ – it happened because I’m an idiot and can’t spell my own name!”
An extra ‘s’? No problem. We’re pretty sure it stands for sensational, stunning, striking or spectacular, and who could argue with that? Written by Judy Darley
Find out more on Amanda’s website – go to www.amandasperkinscrochetblankets.com
“I LOVE TO SEE ALL THE COLOURS TOGETHER AT THE SAME TIME, LIKE PAINT CHARTS”