Mystery objects. Experienced knitters may be able to identify them, but will not be on my Christmas list. Texture stitches, the patterns made by arranging knit and purl stitches, are remarkably varied. Here we have Diamond Brocade, King Charles Brocade, and Windowpane, but there are many more. You could also find here the more usual Garter, Stocking, Seed, and Moss.
Polperro Musician, Laughing Boy, Marriage Lines, Vandyke Check. You could decide what to use based only on the names, and end up with some curious results, but knowing that your creations had poetry in them. The common ones are easy to understand: stocking for the stitch used for stockings and Garter for the stitch used to make the garter at the top of the stocking. Seed and Moss (opposite sides of the same stitch) are probably named just on their looks. But who in Polperro (a town in Cornwall) gave Musician its name? Who saw the Organ Pipes in a clever bit of knitting, or decided to commemorate their plowing Ridge and Furrow in a sweater?
I think part of the handmade gift snobbery has to do with being the kind of person who feels the need to wear nothing but designer stuff, and I don’t understand that, either.
I’ve never even heard of most of those stitches!
The thing about handmade articles, is that they are all designer wear. Just not big designer wear.