Sand Matte was my very first knitting pattern, published in May 2023 - a bit over 3 years ago now. I found some jute-rope among my gardening equipment and thought to myself "is it possible to knit with this?". I brought my jute-rope with me to the terrace along with my knitting needles and a cup of coffee, and one afternoon of knitting in the sun later, Sand Matte was born.
A day of knitting in the sun, and sand matte was born.
The rope I used was from Søstrene Grene. Jute is a plant and it yields a cellulose fiber that can be used for a variety of purposes. It's the second most produced plant-fiber in the world, only surpassed by cotton. Jute is bio-degradable (100% compostable!) and the production is both renewable and absorbs CO2. It is used to make packaging material, in furniture, in paper-production and to make interior items like baskets, mats and even wallpaper. It's not that often used to make clothing items, which is understandable, as it is a quite rough fiber. The fiber is sturdy, but looses some of it's strength when wet. If you want to read more about jute, I found all this information at SNL (Norwegian).
Jute-rope does indeed look quite nice in a knitted fabric. I held the rope double and worked a mat in linen stitch. This was a process knit indeed, as the jute-rope is quite rough on the hands. I treated my knitted jute-mat like I would treat any knit fabric, and soaked it after knitting. This was not the best idea, jute does not like to get wet. My mat was still useable, but it did indeed loose a bit of the stitch-definition, so I would recommend anyone interested in knitting with jute to avoid unneccessary water exposure.
Sand Matte (square coaster) in use as a coaster for my teapot. The teapot was purchased in Japan more than a decade ago, so I cannot tell you where to get a similar one. The plate in the picture was inherited from my grandmother - it's the design Blue Fluted (Stråmønster) from Porsgrunn Porselensfabrikk. Still in sale and production today, although my plate is from the early 20th century. These are quite easy to find for a good price in second-hand shops in Norway.
My original Sand Matte is still in use to this day, and it is always the companion coaster to my little blue teapot. After I made the teapot-coaster, I started working on a door-mat using the hack-feature in the pattern (the pattern shows you how to scale the pattern to any size). I never managed to finish this. The jute was really rough on my hands, and I only managed to work a little bit of the mat at the time. Eventually, the unfinished project got buried. Maybe I will pick it up again at some point?
I have also made some christmas-themed mug-coasters in HipWool. The color is Very Berry Red. Each coaster used 7-8 grams of yarn and I managed to get 6 coasters from one leftover skein of bright red HipWool. These coasters come out every year as part of our Christmas decorations.
Sand Matte in a red Christmas-themed edition. This is the smallest size. These are knit in HipWool from HipKnitShop in the color Very Berry Red. I used 8 grams per coaster and embroidered the edges with leftover white yarn for a rustic and cosy look.
In 2025, I rewrote the pattern a tiny bit and gave it a visual makeover, so it looks more like my more recent patterns. And just recently, I provided another update. I simplified the instructions a tiny bit and added another size of mat, a 20x20 coaster which works well for pots and pans. Finally, I translated the pattern to French. I do all my translations myself, and French is a new language which I am working on improving my skills in. This small pattern was a nice little exercise for me. Hope you like it!
Sand matte, some more samples in Sandnes Garn Tykk Line (unfortunately a discontinued yarn).
Find the pattern for Sand Matte here:
Comments ()