Cottonwood Test

Heritage Museum and Gardens, where the installation of Idenditatum Arborum will be this summer, asked for a picture of some of the finished panels on trees for some PR they are doing. Since I only have five done, I took a pict of one lonely cottonwood in Sugarhouse Park with all of them on it. This test let a poor cottonwood, who is having an identity crisis, try on a different set of bark skins. It wants to be a paperbark cherry, a rainbow eucalyptus, a palm, a palo verde, and a redwood all at the same time.

Palm Cowl Finished

This cowl is a large cowl but the beauty of the palm bark stitch is that it is versatile and can be made smaller or larger by subtracting or adding cells. The cells are created with short rows so no need for stranding. This was a fun one to do and the accompanying panel was the first one I finished. Here are more picts of the cowl.

Redwood Scarf Finished

In my sprint to finish something in January, I was able to finish my fourth wearable tree bark project. Unfortunately, I did not finish any knitted bark panels for the exhibition. But February is for finishing panels so I will post those when I have at least a couple done.

The Redwood Scarf is perhaps my favorite. It is a very subtle but cozy scarf knit in brioche stitch. The increases and decreases give it the telltale redwood look. If you want to knit one, I have patterns for all of these finished objects but I am waiting to publish them until after the exhibition in June, so you gotta wait. I will show you pictures of the Palm Cowl in a couple days. That is my last finished object until I can get a few of those pesky panels for the exhibition completed.

Palo Verde

I am working on four different bark panels at the same time. I am well on my way to having all four of the wearable item finished but have not started on the panels themselves. That is going to be my push for the rest of the month. Palo verde is the fourth bark that I am trying to recreate. Palo Verde is native to the Sonoran deserts of the American southwest and Mexico. Its name means “green stick” in Spanish referencing the bark’s bright green color. The tree is drought-deciduous, shedding its leaves most of the year and only leafing out after a rainfall. But fortunately, photosynthesis is performed by its green bark despite its lack of leaves.

I love the bright lime green of the bark with the brown scars. It makes it look like a Frankenstein skin. My recreation might be a little brighter than the original but I like it. I made it into a long sideways scarf with buttons on the end. This is my first finished object and I am really getting into putting on the identity of the tree.

To me, palo verde is an independent tree. It doesn’t need to rely on leaves to survive. It can make it on its own! I can be as independent as palo verde while wearing this scarf.