I'm always suspicious of simplistic fashion rules. You know the kind I mean, the ones that are supposed to apply to everyone equally. I think they are like using stereotypes to describe people, there might be a tiny kernel of truth that applies in some cases but the real problem is that they limit our thinking and stop us from considering variations.
Almost
everyone says not to wear horizontal stripes or you will look wide, yet
stripes are a fashion classic and they are one that knitters seem to be
afraid of.
I
would like to suggest that you challenge this fashion rule. Stripes are
an easy to knit pattern that can add colour and freshness to your
wardrobe. So how do you make them work? Take a look at the images above.
I've kept it simple and only used black and white / red and white
samples. Look at each example, first compare the width of the stripes.
Do you see what happens as we go from wide to narrow stripes? That is
what is known as the ladder effect. Narrow stripes encourage the eye of
the viewer to climb up the body. Visually that works like a vertical
line which makes the eye move in the same way. At the far right the
patterns become so busy they come very close to reading more like a
solid, especially when viewed from a distance.
Next,
look at the garments in the center. Where does your eye go? Mine
immediately drops to the wide band at the bottom. Does that give you any
ideas about how single wide stripes should be placed on the body. Maybe
at the shoulder it would be more flattering? Or, what about doing a
folded knitted hem so that the pattern repeats evenly right to the edges
on the garment?
I
choose highly contrasting colours to demonstrate stripe effects. What
if you did stripes of low contrast colours? How does that change the
look? What if you varied the width of the stripes from narrow at the hip
to wider at the shoulder? What if you used more than 2 colours? What if
the contrast colour was low contrast at the hem and high contrast at
the shoulder? Are you getting a sense of why I don't like a single
simplistic rule?
A reader of the original post also pointed out "that stripes are cheerful. Cheerfulness compensates for (alleged) widening, in my book." I fully agree!
Do you have any other observations?
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