Lately I have become interested in wooden interchangeable needles. My metal Addi needles are quite blunt, which is not a problem in itself, but some projects are easier on sharper needles.
I'd been looking for metal interchangeable sets, but Hiya Hiya sharps were too sharp for me. Likewise ChiaoGoo. Ages ago I had purchased KnitPro tips and cable set for a reason now lost in time.
I quite liked the sharpness of those tips, but I did not like wearing off the nickel plating in one project. Enter wooden KnitPro needles. I had a set of Symphony short straights I had purchased with an intention to use them as spindle shafts, but hadn't found the right whorls for the multicoloured shafts.
I tried them out on a project and fell in love with the tips, and how the wood felt in my hands. I had had avoided using straights for decades, until I tried these. Turns out 25 cm is my ideal length of straight needles. I love using them for scarves and shallow shawlettes.
Now the problem is that when you also love knitting big Stephen West shawls, short straights won't really cut it. Hence the acquisition of some interchangeable tips in shawl sizes, and every cable length from 60 cm to 150 cm.
Which in turn introduced the problem of storage. I did not want to buy another set of needles with a case when I only wanted two sizes of tips. Tempting as those sets may be, I am trying to exercise some restraint here.
So, storage. When I need something like this that could be hand made, I look on Etsy. Surely, someone is already making what I need and I can buy it. Usually that is true, but not always.
What I found was close, but not quite what I was looking for. Most of them were in a needle roll style, or folded, both of those very bulky. One seller had this accordion style, but all her cases were pastel, or pink. The trouble with that is that I do not like pastels, or pink.
They didn't have a closed pocket either and I wanted a place for all the end caps and cable keys that was secure. They closed with a button, which I also dislike. Of course, the obvious solution to all these dislikes was to make one exactly as I wanted it to be.
So I did. It has a place for everything — the tips, the cables of all sizes, the caps, the keys, cable connectors, even stitch markers.
I mulled over the zip insertion and accordion attachment until I was happy with the method, and went fabric shopping in my stash. And then I went fabric shopping in a store because nothing I had was appropriate for the lining, and I didn't have big enough pieces of black scraps.
Somewhere along the way my idea of getting only two sizes of tips for shawl knitting morphed into building an interchangeable set with tips from different brands that are manufactured by KnitPro and fit on the same cables. That is still at an idea stage.
It would be fun, though. Not unlike the Dreamz set, but each pair of tips from a different brand or line. Maybe in the future I will arrange a swap of needle tips. Maybe.
For the time being, I am so pleased with my interchangeable needle case that is in the colours I like, and fits all my shawl knitting needle parts in 10 x 12 x 4 cm ultra compact package. With plenty of room for more tips and cables, should my collection grow in the future.