Finishing date: April 2019. Styling and photographed by Natalia Salazar in February 2021.
It had been a couple of years since I finished the mint-colored cardigan with butterflies on the shoulders. Natalia and I thought about using it for our first ever photoshoot, the one with the enormous flower crown, but then I got this idea. The butterflies. Wouldn’t it be fun to spin off that in the styling instead?
And then time passed. I’m great at having ideas and starting new projects. I have a hard time finishing. My thesis is an endlessly growing list of to-dos. During the quarantine Christmas, I got sick of myself. The thesis lives its own life, but at least I could make myself finish one of my crafts projects. So I started crocheting butterflies.
In mid-February 2021, I had made enough. On (what turned out to be) the last properly frozen weekend during this gloriously snowy winter, Natalia (the vaccinated nurse-to-be) and I (the PhD thesis writing hermit) drove up to Natalia’s dad’s cottage in the rural heart of northern Roslagen.
I really needed the break. A change of scenery. The forests and fields under a soft, thick blanket of snow, drenched in a blinding, cleansing February sunlight. Eating and drinking wine in the physical presence of a good friend. Watching well-told fantastical TV tales (HBO’s His Dark Materials, so beautiful). Going all in with the knitwear photoshoot.
The idea started with just the butterflies, but now, I think: she is the Harbinger of Spring. Arriving with the returning sun, not chasing winter away, but gently letting the snow know that we are grateful. Loved the silence and softness and brilliance it brought to the winter darkness. But now, it is time to let go, loosen its frozen grip on the earth, let all the other colors through. And return next year, when the darkness will make us yearn once more. Butterflies, the most summery of insects, following her around like a flock of daemons, brilliant and fragile like hope itself.
The Harbinger of Spring. It felt like she had done her job, finally, by mid-March. Stepping out of the door for my morning walk one day, the air was mild, no bite at all, and the flower beds were full of little green leaves, future crocuses and tulips and daffodils.
The butterfly cardigan. This is one of those awkward pieces that didn’t turn out as I had envisioned. It is difficult with cardigans. More parts that need to come together, and generally you want them to have a tight-ish fit, so adding some extra stitches in the side just to be safe is not really an option. This is also when I realized that my stitches probably are a bit on the tighter side, because the measurements on this ended up completely off, compared to the cardigan pattern I used to guide me regarding the size.
(Also, for full transparency, I gained a little bit of weight during the period between making the first sketch of this cardigan, and finally finishing it eighteen or so months later – it was the beginning of my PhD and I was too stressed and turning 30 as well – things just happen to the female body with age.)
Either way, it turned out too tight and I didn’t feel like unravelling it all, so. I crocheted some extra room into it along the bottom edge – an advantage of the cardigan. It looks a bit odd. If it had been meant for someone else, I would have been too embarrassed to give it to them. For myself, I’m fine with it. I think the pattern on the yoke, especially the colors, turned out so nicely, I can look past the awkward bottom half. And now I know to be better with the measurements for future cardigans. It worked for the Harbinger of Spring, though. A month after her forays in the Roslagen snow, spring had arrived. And that same afternoon, I saw the first butterfly of the year. It fluttered past my home office window so quickly, I didn’t properly see – but I think it could have been a small tortoiseshell butterfly. It definitely looked orange. Maybe one of the butterfly daemons gotten loose from the Harbingers crown.
Katja Malmborg 