Meet Rebecca Velasquez

O'Hara Hat

 I am so happy to introduce you to one of my favorite designers, Rebecca Velasquez.  We have known each other and worked together for such a long time now.  (And amazingly she keeps agreeing to help me out!)  Rebecca's work has been everywhere, and I am sure you have seen a project of hers and have loved it.  In addition to  being a very talented crochet designer, she is raising and homeschooling 4 kids.  While designing these projects they were relocating and needed to live in their trailer for a few months.  I know I would not have been as creative as she clearly is while having all my monkeys on top of me!  Being an amazing mom and so creative is just one of the reasons I admire her.

O'Hara Hat

In Vintage Modern Crochet, Rebecca designed two projects, O'hara Hat and Yasmine Shawl.  The O'hara hat she came to me with and I immediately thought, YES!  It is a pineapple lace hat in the round, very unique and perfect. Rebecca named the hat for one of the characters on the TV show, Psych.  In the show, they have hidden pineapples everywhere on set.  This hat is just like that, its adorable and when you turn your head the right way shows off the pineapple lace pattern.  You can get the hat pattern for free and see bit of the book too.  The Yasmine Shawl I begged her to design.  I asked for a shawl that could rival any knit lace shawl, in multiple Tunisian lace patterns.  Poor Rebecca showed me lots of lovely swatches and my response was "MORE!"  I kept pushing and she kept adding more and more creative additions to the shawl.  I think the end result is awesome!  The shawl is definitely not for beginners, but for anyone ready to challenge themselves and learn a ton of new stitch patterns in the process.

Last week we got to chat a bit about crochet:

Yasmine Shawl

RC: What is it about crochet that inspires you to design in it?
RV: Oh, wow. This is going to sound weird. I understand crochet, it makes sense to me. My kids' math makes me want to cry, but crochet is my language. The process of creating is what inspires me. 

RC: What is one of your favorite techniques in crochet?
RV: Lately, I've been experimenting with Tunisian crochet. It is a lot of fun. So versatile. I've enjoyed playing around with Irish crochet, too. But I always come back to basic, every day crochet. 

RC: What was the last item that you made for yourself (in any craft)?
RV: A beaded keychain

RC: What other crafts do you love?
RV: Really, anything crafty. I'm not at all a good artist, but I love to "illustrate" scripture in my Bible and in a mixed-media scripture journal. Also, I love to knit. I like to say that crochet is my work, knitting is my hobby. 

Yasmine Shawl

RC: What was your inspiration behind your designs in Vintage Modern Crochet?
RV: For the O'Hara hat, inspiration was the stitch itself. I wanted to create something a little non-conventional with the pineapple stitch. So I started playing with it in-the-round and the natural decrease of the pineapple sort of became a hat on its own!  With the Yasmine Shawl, inspiration was really more experimentation. A lot of "what ifs" and "ooo, this will be pretty". I really wanted to go farther and do more with this piece. 

RC: What is next for you?  Where can people see more of your work?
RV: I'm doing a few designs here and there for magazine publication, but my biggest project right now is a collection of collections I've got in the works. This will be an RV publication. I'm hoping to get the first set out in the fall. 

You can find more about Rebecca on:
Instagram
Facebook
Twitter
Ravelry
And her website, www.RebeccaVelasquez.com