Vintage Caravan

This week I made one of my vintage caravans for an Etsy customer. It is always a bit odd for me when I return to one of patterns that I wrote a while ago. Did I really do that? But it turned out the same as my original caravan, which is always reassuring.

You can find the Vintage Caravan Pattern here, which also explains how you can make a caravan keyring. I still have a few of these and other transport keyrings in my Etsy Shop.

Keyrings for Christmas

Although I am not doing any craft fairs this year (huge way to reduce stress in the run up to Christmas) I did think I should add a bit of stock to my Etsy shop. You may have already seen my caravan keyrings, which have been popular, but I thought that handknitted car keyrings would be even better. After all more people own a car than a caravan.

And if perhaps you drive a bus, you also need somewhere handy to put the keys for that!

So these keyrings are for sale in my Etsy shop. I also offer to personalise them by adding an embroidered name to the felt back. Or if you fancy making your own keyring then the pattern is available in all the usual places. It includes the instructions for all three keyrings that you see here: caravan, car and bus. They are a great way to use up those oddments of wool that you have left over.

Vintage Caravan Magazine

I was delighted to get an email from Anne in Australia, who had seen my caravan keyrings in Vintage Caravan Magazine. (Facebook Page is Here) One of them now holds the keys to her lovely vintage caravan, which was exactly the sort of thing I was hoping for. She sent me some photos too. Isn't it cute. I love the coordinated inside, as well as the silver and wood on the outside.

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And here is my own retro girl reading the magazine! You might also notice her new dress, which I am going to write about on a separate post. I have also been scanning the pages of Vintage Caravan Magazine and daydreaming of having my own little home on wheels one day.

Vintage Caravans

I've been mulling over this idea for a while. A knitted vintage caravan. Henrietta my 2CV was a curvy car, and that led me to think if I could knit some other curvacious vehicles. Knitting doesn't really lend itself to being angular. What is more curvy that a vintage caravan?

I thought this caravan would make either a really cute toy or ornament, or perhaps be useful as a pincushion. But the pattern also contains instructions for a simpler version where you only knit one side and make it into a keyring for your caravan keys. These few will be for sale in my Etsy shop. I think they are so cute and would now quite like my own vintage caravan.

When I think of a new idea for a knit, I normally go through a similar process. I do a very quick look on the knitting websites to see if anyone has already had my idea. If there are lots of really good patterns, I usually stop then. What can I add to this? But with my vintage caravan I really couldn't find anyone who has knitted anything quite like this. (Apologies if I have missed someone's brilliant knit.) Then if there are a very few, or no patterns, I say hurrah!  Although this may mean that I am designing things that are so quirky very few people want to knit them. I would love to be able to come up with something that is both quirky, unique, and popular. But "chin up" I say. Caravans are one of the popular things I can think of, and who does not love a retro vintage caravan

The pattern designing process then usually involves me sitting and knitting with a notepad by side. I then type up a first version, and after that I amend, and amend and amend ... But I always feel a lot happier when I have that first typed draft, even if I know I am going to have to alter and change a lot. 

These caravans are knitted with doubleknit, and quite a fine needle 2.5mm. This was because I wanted all the pieces to be firm, so the overall caravan wouldn't bulge too much. Everything is knitted on two needles (even the wheels). The finished caravan is quite small (8cm long and 7.5 cm tall). I am thinking of knitting a little car that would be to scale and could go infront.