Love math and computer science? Your future career may lie in an unexpected field — knitting.
Allison O'Mahony used to be a software developer. Now, she is a professional and technical designer for knitting patterns. The skills she learned in her old job are more applicable to her new career than some may suspect.
"You would be surprised, but software development really lends itself very well to knitting, to writing patterns and to editing patterns," O'Mahony told CBC Radio's Weekend AM in her St. John's studio for her knitting business, Kniterations.
"There's a lot of math involved, a lot of logic involved. It's a very technical process."
Started as hobby
Knitting began as a hobby for O'Mahony, and she started writing patterns without any specific training in the field.
"I got into it because I was looking for a pattern for something very specific, couldn't find one, so I decided I would just try my hand and come up with something on my own," she said. "So that's how it started."
Previously knitting was just thought of as something that was useful and now it's more of an art form.- Allison O'Mahony
Now developing her own patterns, and editing patterns for other designers and publications, is her career.
"I write knitting patterns, which involves everything from coming up with an idea for a design to actually writing out the pattern, writing it up, putting it into a template format, and then selling it as a knitting pattern," O'Mahony said.
When editing patterns, she goes through line by line to check for errors and make sure all the numbers and stitches work out as intended.
"Essentially, they're trusting me to go through the pattern from top to bottom, make sure there are no mistakes," she said. "Everything you could possibly imagine that could go wrong with a knitting pattern, that's what I'm trying to catch."
It's a process that can take between one and four hours per pattern.
Clients all over the world
Many of O'Mahony's patterns have names inspired by Newfoundland places: the Wreckhouse hat and cowl, the Chance Cove shawl, the Little Heart's Ease mittens.
But her customers aren't just local. She's written patterns for American publications like Interweave Knits and two Knit Picks books.
A surprising number of edit requests come in from Australia, O'Mahony said, and her patterns are similarly far flung.
"I've been able to build a pretty decent following so far, and I have customers and clients from all over the world," she said.
The style of her patterns, which involve more intricate designs and delicate, lacy stitches, reflect the changing face of knitting.
"Previously knitting was just thought of as something that was useful and now it's more of an art form," O'Mahony said.
"Really, the sky's the limit when you look at it that way."