Stockinette Market: January 30th-February 28th

Welcome to the one year anniversary of the Stockinette Market! What a momentous year it's been in the knitting industry. I've always enjoyed tracking trends, but doing so with concrete data rather than vague theories and suppositions has been a whole new experience.  I feel like my brain's grown three sizes over the last year! I hope you've also enjoyed coming along with me on this journey, and are looking forward to what happens over the next year as much as I am.  I'm planning a year in review post, but it may be a bit delayed due to various other deadlines.  My life of shuffling priorities and to-do lists is never dull, I'll tell you that. :) But without further ado, here are the numbers for February!

 

The average percentage numbers for February, after the ubiquitous neck accessories in the first spot, show a very slight shift in priority for knitters: while hats held the second spot last month with 13%, it's now held by pullovers at the same percentage.  Cowls remain in third, dropping from 13 to 12%, and hats now come in fourth with 11%.  Cardigans have gained very slightly from 10 to 11%.  There are also more categories this month than there were last month (toys and men's garments joined the list, while mittens dropped off), with subsequently smaller percentages of the total.  All in all, not huge changes, but an interesting shift back towards the dominant categories we saw last spring. 

February was a busy one in terms of both industry publications and individual promotions, which showed as spikes in many categories over the month.  Neck accessories again remained dominant, with several high spikes corresponding to promos and collection releases.  There was an organic spike near the beginning of the month, and then two strong ones mid-month and towards the end corresponding to a promo by lace shawl designer Corrina Ferguson and a pattern release in Lucy Hague's Celtic Cable Shawls collection, which brought her other shawls to the fore.  There were also several garment-heavy releases or promos this month, such as Alana Dakos' Botanical Knits 2 and amirisu Spring 2014 mid-month and Laura Aylor's promo late in the month, bringing her many pullovers to the fore.  Cowls also saw a few organic spikes, as did hats mid-month. 

Even with these various spikes, however, most categories remained relatively steady through the month.  There were slight organic rises in kid's garments and cardigans over the month, as well as a slight drop in hats. Toys rose as a result of being featured in the Ravelry Spotlight near the end of the month.  All others remained steady throughout the month.

Yarn type saw solid yarns and 3+ color projects losing the ground they gained last month, and tweeds gaining slightly.  All others remained steady, though there were many spikes in semi-solids, solids, and 2 colors projects.   The first saw lots of play in the promos and publications of the month, with Pom Pom Quarterly Spring 2014, Veera Valimaki and Joji Locatelli's collection, Interpretations, Corrina Ferguson's promo, Lucy Hague's Celtic Cable Shawls, and Laura Aylor's promo all featuring them heavily.  Solids had fewer intentional spikes, with only the Ravelry spotlight on toys (which also caused the spike in 2 color projects a little more than halfway through the month) being a clear corollary.  2 color projects also featured in Veera and Joji's collection, with quite a few stripes or color blocks.  There was also a small spike mid-month in tweeds, correspondent to the release of amirisu and the Botanical Knits 2 collection.  Variegateds and self-striping yarns remained steady at a low buzz, their place often secured by consistent favorites like Wingspan and Hitchhiker.

Modeled garments continued to hold steadily in the lead, with spikes correspondent to days of overlap between collections or promos, such as when Pom Pom and Interpretations shared the front page and amirisu and Botanical Knits 2 did the same.  Though there were spikes in items shown flat, they were all organic and didn't correlate with any of the major players in the month. 

Again this month we've seen a wild variation in fabric type, with texture falling after lots of presence in Interpretations and in a forum-driven boost in crocheted socks and slippers around the 10th, and despite an organic spike near the end of the month.  Stockinette had a strong rise towards the end of the month due to a heavy presence in Laura Aylor's work, and there was also a strong lace spike concurrent with Corrina Ferguson's promotion.  Colorwork fell very slightly, seeing a strong start in Interpretations, then later to a lesser extent in the Ravelry spotlight on toys and in Laura Aylor's work. 

Color slowed down its crazy fluctuation a bit this month, with white taking the lead for the first half off the month and then again several times throughout the second half.  Grey saw several spikes with Interpretations, amirisu, and Laura Aylor, as did red right around Valentine's day, and brown and blue organically late in the month.  Based on these spikes, white fell over the month, while grey, blue, and brown rose, with brown being the sharpest climb.  All other colors fell, which brings us back to almost the original color scheme we saw at this time last year. 

So all in all, though February was a busy month in terms of publications and promos, most of what we saw during the month stayed consistent throughout and tallied with previous months or last year.  As we saw last year, March is another very busy one in pattern publishing, and it's been jam-packed so far.  I look forward to seeing where it goes!