Designing hats

Some of you may have come on over here from Ravelry.  This is my first entry for the hat design competition to promote Kate Davies' yarn Milarrochy Tweed.  I was really pleased with how this turned out, not least because this is only the second time I have charted and knitted a crown design like this.

Now, you might recognise the pattern on the main part of the hat if you have seen my brown Museum waistcoat from last year.  The point of the design is to use the classic OXO configuration but to use five different lozenge patterns.  This increases the interest, for the knitter as well as the wearer, but it does require a bit more concentration since there are five separate patterns to keep track of in each row.  Having it all charted out makes this possible, so I drew it all out on knitters' graph paper.

So now, this raises interesting questions.  If this is a design competition what sources would be valid to use without breaching copyright? If you collect traditional patterns together and chart them out, does that give you the copyright on those patterns, or only on the charts?  This is particularly relevant with stitch directories where surely the compiler cannot claim ownership of those combinations of knit and purl.

Once I had finished knitting, I gave it a bath and then chose a saucepan with the same large circumference as my own head to block it on.  This stretched out the crown very nicely, but it did look very odd while it was drying.

Julie (See Comments), you will be relieved to know that after a quick wash and brush up we were able to go out for a late but civilised lunch last Friday.  My husband commented on how the whole adventure made the contrast even more enjoyable.