Yesterday, I mentioned that yellow is a tough color. You either love it or don’t, and even if you love it, it might not be flattering to wear. I’ve seen a few comments floating around about the color choices in the Spring issue of Knitscene, particularly the Gold Dust Woman story. Unfortunately, some of the comments were, uh, not that nice.  Well, you don’t have to make it yellow. Changing the color of yarn you use is the easiest yarn substitution to make, but if I’ve learned anything from working at a yarn store, this is something that a lot of knitters struggle with.

Here’s what I ask customers at the shop when they’re asking about color:

1. What’s the project? If there’s lots of lace or texture, I steer them away from wildly variegated yarn so that the stitches aren’t lost in the variegation.
2. What colors do you not like? This is pretty self-explanatory. If you don’t like yellow, then don’t choose yellow.
3. What colors do you like to wear in your everyday wardrobe? For example, I wear a lot of blacks, greys, and neutrals. Anything that coordinates with these will work for me as long as it’s a color I like. I’m also not afraid of color so as long as I like the color, it’s a good choice. If you wear a lot of blues, choose a color that coordinates well with blue.

The only hard and fast rule for choosing color is If you like it and you like your project, then it’s perfect.

Let’s look at Arnica again, and we’ll use my sketch from the submission to illustrate the color choice.

Below is the original sketch from my submission to Knitscene. It’s yellow because I was submitting to a call for designs that were yellow. My original swatch was worked in fingering weight yarn that was a golden yellow.

Now change that original sketch to lilac. Lilacs your favorite flower? Your favorite color? How about Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sport in Dupage?

What if you want to go with a very light colored neutral to go with your favorite black shirt? Look at this silvery blue gray Shepherd Sport in Dobson.

Remember, when you’re looking at a pattern, unless you absolutely love the color shown, you aren’t tied to the choices of the designer or the magazine editor. Choose what you’ll wear. Choose what you love. You’ll end up with a project you adore.