Short row knitting and skies are a made-in-heaven combination. For a color lover, playing with the hues of sunrises and sunsets is particularly thrilling. Any color works. Skies have no color boundaries and sail into all shades of the spectrum, including all at once, as in a rainbow.

But sunrises and sunsets put on the best show. I’m guessing that everyone reading this issue has a sunset picture or two tucked away in either their drawer or their memory. I know I do. I’ve seen sunsets over Africa, behind the golden spires of Istanbul, across the plains of the Sahara, and, as of this moment, a bright, eager sunrise washing the skies outside my window.
And yet the wrap you see here was inspired by the Southwest US, my beloved Santa Fe/Taos area. I’ve always loved desert skies. The combination of dry air, mountain ranges, and the rising/setting sun, is simply brilliant.

I’ve used mix of silks and silk blends, as usual--lots of HandMaiden Sea Silk and i-silk, plus Mulberry silk here and there. I’ve been particularly smitten with i-silk lately, appreciating the deeply-colorful matt finish which so perfectly shows up the glossier pure silks. It’s stitch definition for lace edgings is beyond compare. This yarn really gets the point.

My needle size hit the sweet spot at US 7-8 but never let needle size prevent you from adding thicker yarns where you feel like it. Variegated hand-painted yarns always enhance an art knit, since those painterly variations in hue hint at watercolors or oil paint. Nearly all of the main colors in this creation in subtly variegated.
Since it’s impossible to describe the color changes row by row unless writing a book, use the pictures for guidance. Think of dark moving to light, with one end featuring violets and midnight blues, and moving through the hotter hues to the opposite end where, again, the violets are introduced.

Stitches: half linen stitch and drop stitch