Welcome to the April edition of Meet the Maker – Designer Spotlight! This month I am excited to introduce Shannon, crochet designer behind The Loophole Fox. I got to know Shannon when we were both sharing one of our patterns in a blog hop. It was my first hop and she helped me every step of the way!
Tell us a little bit about yourself!
Hi there! I’m Shannon, the designer and crochet lover behind The Loophole Fox. Nearly 20 years ago, I taught myself to crochet from books I bought with allowance money and a ton of determination. I’ve always been a pretty hands-on and artistic type of person – willing to fix anything on my own, learn to do most things and create most things. Designing crochet projects came naturally to me. I aim to design cozy, warm and practical items that help you feel comfortable, at home and happy. Within this scope, I set out to write patterns that are relatively easy, packed with personality and easily giftable or able to be donated.
In life (and within my blog/presence), I aim to spread happiness and love for myself and others. At my core, I feel called to help make the world a better place and believe in helping others whenever possible, even if that means one baby step at a time. You can often find me donating patterns or funds to causes I believe in or offering a helping hand. Most of my patterns are designed with the ability to donate or gift in mind, to help spread love from my community to yours.
Outside of being a crochet designer, I’m a wife, an animal lover with two cats and a dog, a huge nerd and a nature lover. When I’m not crocheting, you can find me curled up on my corner of the couch reading an epic fantasy novel and eating Flaming Hot Cheetos, playing video games with my husband or wandering around in nature trying to find the best place to swim.
How long have you been crocheting?
I learned to crochet working on 20 years ago now (let’s not talk about how long ago that was) and picked it up off and on throughout my teenage years and early twenties. I became more serious about crocheting on a daily basis in my mid-twenties to help with my anxiety. At the time, I was working as a Sales Manager for an insurance company which was a very high stress, high energy environment. As someone who would label themselves an introvert, I needed something that helped me create, relax and feel more confident in the small amounts of time I had available. Crochet was that “thing”.
“Because everyone needs a little color and joy in their lives…”
What types of patterns do you design? Do you focus on any certain types?
I generally design crochet patterns that fall into a few categories. These categories would be donate/gift, practical and cozy/happy. This leaves me with the ability to publish a somewhat wide range of patterns. I design a lot of baby blankets to be gifted or donated, warm and cozy items like scarves and hats, and practical items like tote bags or bath sets. I do some home decor as well, like wall hangings. Because everyone needs a little color and joy in their lives and I think they’re fantastic gifts. 🙂
Is there anything in particular that inspires your designs?
I guess it’s hard for me to put into words one specific thing that inspires me to design. I have the overarching “comfortable/happy/loved” vibe that I try to work into my designs. Whether that’s wrapping a baby in a crochet blanket made just for them, a tote bag so you don’t have to carry all your things in your hands or a cozy scarf, I’m inspired by helping myself and others feel comfortable and happy.
What is the main reason that you crochet?
I crochet as a hobby for a couple of reasons. First, it has helped me immensely to manage my anxiety. There’s something about being able to focus on the yarn, feel the look in my hand and the repetitive motions that really do help. I’m an infinitely happier person when I have crochet in my life and this has been true for me throughout the last 20ish years.
Additionally, I crochet as a hobby because I have this, like, need to create things. I’ve always made art projects, painted, drawn and been very hands on. Crochet is a simple and somewhat cheap hobby to keep up (and my cats can’t walk across the canvas and ruin the whole painting, haha!).
How did you decide on your maker name?
Oh, man. When I decided to start my blog, my husband and I talked about clever business names for days. It wasn’t unusual to have one of us yell from the kitchen while cooking dinner “Hey, what about this name!?”
I ended up landing on “The Loophole Fox” as a clever, crochet-related play on “crafty fox”. The loophole part came from the actual technique of crocheting – we are making a bunch of loopholes, after all. Fox for “crafty fox” but also because I love foxes and in many cultures, they represent love, wisdom and playfulness. I felt it the perfect name for the designs I planned to create.
Do you have a favourite pattern you designed and why?
I would have to say that right now my favorite designs of my own are my Summer Tote and my Something New baby blanket. The Summer Tote is so practical and I use it for everything (especially yarn shopping!). The Something New baby blanket was a gift for someone expecting a new addition and it turned out so timeless and classic. They had to pry the gift out of my fingers to receive it! It was so hard to let it go.
“…my favorite thing about designing is being connected with other makers.”
What do you love most about being a crochet designer/maker?
Hands down my favorite thing about designing is being connected with other makers. Whether that’s with other crochet designers or crocheters themselves, I absolutely love connecting with others who love the same hobby I do and being able to support them and show them love – even from a computer screen.
Without having become a crochet designer myself, I think I would have been unlikely to connect with so many wonderful, lovely people.
What do you love least about being a crochet designer/maker?
The thing I love the least about being a crochet designer and running a crochet related blog is the amount of time I don’t get to crochet! I spend so much time on the computer, typing, doing technical things… I’m not complaining of course, but I would say that’s what I love the least.
“Learning to crochet can be frustrating.”
Is there any helpful advice you could give someone just learning to crochet?
Be kind to yourself (and to others). Learning to crochet can be frustrating. It’s easy to want to throw the whole project across the room and punt the hook out the door. Be kind to yourself even through the mistakes and the frustration. All of the mistakes and frustration are necessary to learn. None of us were great at it right off the bat. 😉
You have to walk before you can run. If a certain teacher (like a Youtube tutorial) isn’t working for you, try a different one. We all have different ways of learning and sometimes the person teaching just isn’t right for you. Both you and that teacher have done nothing wrong – we just all have different styles of teaching and learning. Sometimes you have to find the person who explains it just the right way for you for it to be like “Ah-Ha! I get it!”
When you are not crocheting, what are you most likely doing?
If I’m not crocheting, I’m usually wandering around in nature with my dog, reading a big epic fantasy novel or trying to get 100% achievements on the hardest video games I can get my hands on. I’m kind of a mega nerd. 🙂
What is your favorite type/weight of yarn to work with and why?
My go to yarn weight is usually medium (4). I design with this mostly because it’s one of the easier yarns for beginners to work with. Medium weights have the sweet spot of working up somewhat quickly while maintaining more delicate stitch definition.
I am definitely branching out to thinner yarn weights more often, though. I’ve done a few in DK weight previously and am currently designing a pattern in fingering weight.
Do you have a favorite place to crochet?
When the weather permits (I’m in Southern California where it gets boiling hot), I like to sit on my balcony, crochet and enjoy the sun with my dog and cats. Usually, though, it’s way too hot so I like to sit on my corner of the couch, put on a podcast and crochet away.
Do you have any upcoming designs or new plans in the future as a maker?
I will be releasing a few designs over the upcoming months from The Loophole Fox – I am working on a very light weight shawl for spring and summer, a new bag pattern and a bath set. All of those are due to come out within the next two months! Yay!
My biggest plan for this year is to actually slow down on designing and become more hands on in teaching crochet. I’ve been working on a lot of tutorials that are both photo and video. Designing less is actually harder than I thought it would be!
If you could create with any other medium (other than yarn), what would it be?
I have done a lot of creating in other mediums. Mostly, I’ve done a lot of drawing (both on paper and via computer) and painting. I spent a lot of my teenage years wanting to be a painter (Hello useless Fine Arts degree!) and, when time and space permits, I still pull out a canvas and paint.
I would absolutely love to dive into woodworking, and I love the idea of creating my own furniture and decorative items from wood. With the amount of time I watch people woodwork on Youtube for fun, I could have picked up some tools and done it myself, haha! I don’t have the space though, so that will have to wait. I am happy to watch others create for now.
For more about Shannon and her many other pattern from The Loophole Fox, check out her Blog!
You can find The Loophole Fox on social media: Etsy , Facebook , and Instagram.
I hope you enjoyed learning a little bit more about Shannon, from The Loophole Fox in this month’s edition of Meet the Maker – Designer Spotlight!
I hope you come back next month to meet another awesome maker!
Are you interested in free patterns? Check out some of my free patterns below or click HERE to view them all!
