Have you knit this month’s Confident Knitting pattern, Hunter Hammersen’s Evolve Cowl, yet? I cast off and blocked mine last week. Finishing it was bittersweet: while I am thrilled to have a new beautiful cowl to thrown on on a brisk day, I’m missing having it on the needles. The pattern was engaging without being hard, meditative without being mindless. Which I think is actually a good characterisation of much of Hunter’s portfolio and perhaps part of her enormous popularity! Her patterns are always fun, often surprising and very achievable!

Hunter focusses on designing accessories and ‘small things’ that range from pretty and practical (my Constellate Hat, for instance, is probably my most worn hat!) to the delightfully idiosyncratic. Ever wanted to knit a small lighthouse? A lace cover up for an egg? An acorn? A small envelope? Hunter’s your designer!

Let’s start with the pretty and practical!

Hunter’s accessory designs are a thing to behold – explorations of texture that often have surprising details. I could spend a whole post, at least, talking about her hat designs alone. Her wildly popular Constellate Hat (which Jen and I have both knitted) was my first introduction to dip stitches. Her most recent hat pattern, Lucent, looks like a plain stocking stitch cap from one side, but has an awesome starburst feature that elevates the whole thing. But Hunter’s got more than hat tricks up her sleeve. Beautiful socks, innovative shawls, handy hand warmers, and cowls (of course) … if you’ve not had a look at her designs (or books!) lately, treat yourself to a trip down that rabbit hole!

But Hunter also documents and designs some unapologetically fanciful small things, almost all of which are on my to-knit list. Jen whipped up this awesome tree ornament for her knitting group’s ornament swap in 2019. Hearts, stars, toadstools, tiny baskets for holding knitting notions, Hunter’s figured them out so we don’t have to, and aren’t we the luckier for it?

Designers’ ideas, of course, are only as good as the patterns they write, and Hunter’s are a joy to knit from. Unfamiliar techniques are all explained, many include information on changing yarn and gauges, everything’s clear as can be! Attention to detail doesn’t stop with her patterns. Over on her Instagram account, she fastidiously documents her design process (with polished and oddly calming photos). Her posts are detailed and considered and often witheringly funny. If you’re on Instagram and not one of the nearly 66,000 people who follow her, I’m going to suggest you rectify that as soon as possible!

And of course, if you’d like to knit Hunter’s design contribution to Confident Knitting and get stuck into some excellent blocking, you can get your copy of Confident Knitting in the online shop. When you purchase, you’ll get all the patterns released to date, as well as a new pattern and tutorial released every month through February 2022 (with print books shipping in September 2021). The next pattern is released 3rd May! And we’re having fun exploring blocking over in this month’s Confident Knitting KAL in The Knitalong Hub. We’d love to see you there!

Related tutorials: Excellent Blocking with wires and without; Dip Stitches