Running Horse Bucket Hat

Not my daughter, but a fashion student friend.

 

My daughter asked me to knit her a bucket hat with horses running around the brim. A fun project, and as I was planning it, my husband suggested that I have the horses in different poses, as if on a film reel. 

We used to live in Kingston-upon-Thames, and in the local museum there was a section on Eadweard Muybridge, a local photographer who was a pioneers of film. Kingston Museum was a small but really excellent place, with exhibits from Kingston from prehistory to the current day, and other exhibitions and events. 

So I knitted my hat, and then jokingly said to my husband, this probably isn't original, someone somewhere will have done a Muybridge Hat. And a quick click on Ravelry, and there it was, the Zoetrope by Leah Batt. My hat was a one-off, and is not going to be a pattern. I think I can admit that I prefer her hat, and wish I had found it first. I ended up embroidering the legs and ears on my horses, while hers are proper fair isle. It is also nicely set out to look like a film reel, and she has done a clever series of linked photos to look like a moving picture, which I guess is the point. It just shows how difficult it is to come up with a truly unique idea in knitting, or anything.

                           Not as pretty, but me in the hat when just finished.

Greek Horses

For eight weeks I have to take my son in to central London on Saturday morning, as he is doing what is called a mathematical masterclass at Gresham College. This is pretty exciting for both of us. I think I have mentioned that he is dyslexic, and struggles with much at school. But not maths, where apparently he is a bit of a whizz. So being picked by his school for this special course is really great for his self-esteem.

But I was also a bit worried about what I will do each week, for the 3 hours 30 minutes when he is doing maths. Although I live on the edge of London, it is quite unusual for me to spend time in the centre especially with nothing specific that I must do. 

Isn't the outside of The British Museum impressive, but I also love the view of the ceiling once you go inside? The modern and classic architecture has been combined in a really interesting way.

The British Museum is absolutely enormous, and full of antiquities from all over the world (which I'm not completely sure that we should have, but that is a whole blog post in itself). So what to photograph? I thought I had to limit myself a bit, and focus. My first idea was to look at the human form in different cultures. But even that would be a huge topic.

So puzzling what to do, I wandered into the Greek section, and was enchanted by these tiny metal animals, and the numerous animals paintings I found on pots. I came home with 84 pictures on my camera, so expect a few more museum posts. 

I  suppose the horses most associated with Ancient Greece, are the famous Trojan Horse, and also the winged horse, Pegasus. There are other grander and bigger horses in Greek art, but I love the elegant simplified forms of these little models, and paintings. You can really imagine the metal forms having been held and smoothed in a Greek hand all those years ago. Or the artist making the brush strokes on the pot. They look so fresh.

So expect a bit of history over the next few weeks, although I am also pondering if I could knit a Greek horse ...