December 2025 – tracey doxey

Experimenting with colours that you love.

Tell me …. What is it that puts you off using or experimenting with new colours in your stranded colour work project?

I’m currently in Fujiyoshida – a town at the base of Mount Fuji, for 28 days. I’ve been knitting my Tree and Star sleeves with an idea to add them to a fabric body. I bought a couple of Kimono from the flea market at Hanazono Shrine in Tokyo but the fabric doesn’t work for a body with these sleeves. So, I may knit another Kaleidoscope jumper body using 3mm needles so that all the people who wanted a larger size can see how a needle increase from 2:75mm to 3mm will make to the overall size. Would that be of interest to anyone who was hoping for the next size up?

I am using my stash yarn as evidence of a journey in colour. A journey that anyone could do with their own stash. I kept knitting this motif in different colours because I couldn’t settle on just one. Each version felt like a different mood—quiet, bold, playful, grounded. The first colours of brightest pinks with my initials and the year 2026, when the project will be finished, felt like really owning the sleeve as – not just knitting but creative freedom.

That’s when I realized the pattern isn’t about my colour choices at all. It’s about giving you a place to try yours. I would like to invite you to have a look at these sleeves and think of the colours and if you were going to knit the same jumper – which ones might you give a try.

When I lived in Shetland, my knitting patterns and their colour choices were devised around the wild Shetland landscape, the croft house that I lived in and the woman who had lived in the house for 83 years until 1960. But now, the Kaleidoscope jumper has been more playful, named after my own kaleidoscope at home, which has a great big blue marble at the end.

Kaleidoscope

Would you like to try this jumper pattern for your everyday self—or your future self? I am wearing this jumper daily in Japan – it matches the sky and I am having a lot of fun wearing it with the matching hat and a tweed jacket. On Sunday, we all (from the residency) did a drop-in session for anyone who would like to knit or weave or trying punch needling. So many people came to see us including some Tokyo Fashion guys who wore all black, all brown or all Navy and I suggested that they needed a little colour – like a Fair Isle vest just showing through their dark colours -for every day. They were very interested in the colour idea.

The motif repeats consistently and the colours can be swapped without recalculating the whole pattern. I designed this so colour changes feel playful, not precious.

The pattern doesn’t ask you to commit to one look—it gives you a place to experiment. To trust your instincts. To surprise yourself.

If you want a project where colour gets to be personal, this one might be for you.

Swatch your colour ideas first – always swatch for colour to see what works and what doesn’t – for you. Keep the motif and the background colours with enough contrast so that the pattern is not muddied. And just experiment – this is the perfect motif.

Experimenting with colours that you love.

Here is the Kaleidoscope Jumper Let me know in the comments if you have bought the pattern and are still considering the colours you might choose.

Here are the Tree and Star sleeves which are alternative sleeves to the Tree only sleeves in the original pattern.

Let me know what you think about your colour choices.

Creative expression

I’m sitting on the roof of our residency, watching sunrise over Fuji, and I finally figured out that it’s Saturday. Being on an artist residency for a month, in another place, city, country, is kind of not knowing what day it is. To be fully immersed in place and a practice of making whatever comes to mind, and experiencing and finding new things in a new city that you never knew existed removes dates on a calendar and even day names.

I think it’s day 12. I finally settled into this place with new people and new building. On a practical level I’m still knitting. I’ve been knitting my second sleeve using the colours that I brought with me and really enjoying how they both sleeves sit alongside each other.

We’ve all had an artist interview with the people who manage the residency here. The questions were quite interesting – Tell us about you, what can you bring to Fujiyoshida, what does the residency space mean for you and a couple more questions that I’ve forgotten. I think what I bring here is an enduring curiosity for a place and culture (not everyone sees that in me) and an ability to share my findings with many people on my website blog and on Instagram. Of course I share just my perspective but I have a pretty keen eye.

Yesterday I was picked up by a complete stranger that contacted me through Instagram. She is called Shannon. She and her sister Pat were visiting their brother Mike who lives quite close to Fujiyoshida. We went to the Itchiku Kubota Art Museum, which is a museum built in 1994 by Itchiku Kubota to house his permanent exhibition of his work. It was quite remarkable to see the Kimono in all of their glory showing his techniques. If you ever go, my favourites were numbers 19 and 20. The gardens and buildings also represent the world of Itchiku

Then we went to the very beautiful chair museum to the foot of Mt. Fuji, in the forest of Oishi in Fujikawaguchiko. My favourite thing was the initial scent of wood on entering the building and the glorious, viewing Veranda where from many strategically placed small glass Windows in the traditional paper Shoji sliding doors you could view Mount Fuji whilst sitting on extremely exquisite low wooden sofas and chairs.

The view is exquisite. The scent was heavenly and then I found out that the building had been completely dismantled from the Saitama Prefecture in Tokyo, piece by piece and brought her to the mountain side.

If you don’t take chances with new people you never encounter these new things, so thank you Shannon for getting in touch and thank you Mike for driving us everywhere yesterday.

On a basic level, I’m knitting and my knitting is always portable so I sit on the roof at sunrise and watch the sun drench Fuji with colours of red or white light. I take my knitting to cafés and down to the Onsen, Which I visit every day except Wednesdays when it’s closed.

Knitting brought me here. Knitting has taken me to Shetland and other far off places and enabled me to continue to learn and express my creative practice through storytelling.

Here are my sleeves.

I am still not sure whether I will add them to a fabric body or a knitted body but if you want to practice your own colour work and experimentation through pattern and colour – then have to go with these sleeves or the hat pattern because this easy to knit motif lends itself to real experimentation and colour work.

Oh yes, I remember that one of the questions in the artist interview was, ‘what does art mean to you?’ and I think it is entirely about creative expression and freed of thought and when they both come together – you get alchemy

If you’d like to try this motif in a hat or jumper or alternative sleeves, then the links are here.

And even buying a small pattern helps and independent disigner to keep creating – so thank you. https://www.ravelry.com/designers/tracey-doxey

Fujiyoshida

Tonight the moon is blue. It is a full, Super cold moon. Now, it is only 8 pm but utterly freezing outside.

Today, after very little sleep, I decided to walk to the base of Mount Fuji. The morning was cold but bright. To get to Fuji, there is first about a 3 miles to walk from town to the Kitaguchi Hongu Fuji Sengen Shrine, which is a huge complex of buildings – the first small shrine is said to date back to 100AD. It is now a magnificent World Heritage Centre and I can completely understand why. I do not know its history but as I walked up the main road out of town, that leads directly to this place, I recognised that from the 16th century to the 19th century, the path was once lined with inns, temples and shrines and places managed my Oshi (priests) on both sides. Some of these places are still here and also recognised as historical buildings but some are also abandoned or derelict or turned into some other use but the gates at the front remain. Each one had information about its history and on each reading, it became more obvious how special this place has been to generations. The closer I got to Fuji, I began to sense how many people came to pilgrimage, rest and pray here before walking the mountain.

When you finally reach the gateway to Kitaguchi Shrine, it is in a forest of Japanese pine trees which all must be 100 feet tall. The path way is lined by majestic stone lanterns covered in moss. Immediately you are plunged into shadow and coldness under the trees where the pilgrims would’ve originally come to bathe and drink water before setting off to climb out Fuji.

The largest trees are respected with rope and paper ribbons. Even though I do not know or fully understand what is going on here, there is no denying that it is and has always been epic – as epic as when I walked the Great Wall of China and turned around to see the wall meander for miles into the distance, as epic as the day I spent in the Forbidden City and sat and the Pavilion of Crimson snow. These experiences are never forgotten and maybe hold some of the essence of the pilgrims within it. This is not just a complex of spiritual buildings they are stories of lives, beliefs, and gods.

Great stones made into water troughs were covered in ice with little tiny fearn forests growing around the edges. When I looked at the rock, I thought, if stones could talk what stories they would tell of all those who have passed here since Fuji settled from erupting.

I walked around towards the base of the walk up to Fuji. The forest made it very cold and I decided to start the walk to the base until the black bear signs became progressively increased and I thought better off it because I was on my own so I turned back.

Back home, when Takumi, came round to sort the smoke detector in the residency, he said that I could buy a tiny bell from the souvenir shop and hang it off the back of my bag to deter the black bear. I don’t think that I can trust that idea so much.

I have decided I might do a project – after Hokusai’s 100 views of Mount Fuji. I’ve shown quite a few of my Fuji, snaps on Instagram but now I’ve decided to work towards 100 modern views of Fuji. So now, hopefully, I will hopefully concentrate more on the idea but just to keep you going as Fuji shows up every day.

Here are a few views of Fuji in the last three days.

I have been knitting my second tree and star sleeve. I bought two antique kimono from a flea market at Hanazono shrine when I was in Tokyo because I was going to make a cloth body for my Tree and Star sleeves – you know, just make a little jacket body either padded or appliqued or something but I’m not so sure now

Here are the sleeves. I’m knitting them in lots of colours to give you ideas of alternative colour ways, if you’d like to knit the Kaleidoscope jumper or the sleeves yourself instead of in the blues and pinks that I chose.

It’s a very special place here in Fujiyoshida and I’m glad I made my own pilgrimage to get here.

Here is the sleeve pattern on Ravelry, if you would like to knit them for your own project or add them to the Kaleidoscope Jumper instead of the tree sleeves that are in the original pattern – see image on the right above.

So much more has happened, I met my lovely friend, Yuka, who I have know from Uni and we went around the Tokyo toilets (my request) after the Film – Perfect Days. I had such a perfect day.