Designers of the month: July

Crochet and cables! If you haven't tried to cable with your hook, this Heirloom Cabled Sweater is a feast of texture to explore. Cables are created by using front and back post stitches, bringing relief and height, and they look absolutely fabulous. This is a pattern for an intermediate or advanced crocheter, but it's such a reward to create, and a sweater you will love forever.

Drape and fall make these sleeves absolutely sing - the Crochet Ruffle Sleeve Cardigan is a perfect first garment for a beginner, with just a little bit of shaping in amongst a sea of double crochet (UK treble) stitches.

Dreamy, easy, and as soft as a cloud - Le Nuage Wrap (the cloud) is perfect for beginners. With simple stitches, bobbles and an easy to memorise 4 row repeat that takes care of your increases, it's such fun to crochet. Your favourite worsted or aran weight yarn will work beautifully here to create a cosy throw that is at home with jeans or over a summer dress!

A gorgeous mixture of granny stripes and solids, the BonBon Sweater can be customised to any colours you love - there are four sizes to choose from -  S, M, L and XL - and you can bust your stash with any worsted yarn you have left over from other projects, or plan a colour way from scratch.

This fabulous Seabreeze Crop Top could easily be straight off the catwalk. A great design for an adventurous beginner, this chevron ripple pattern is perfect to practise on this size garment before progressing to a larger project like a blanket or afghan. It's made up in Paintbox Cotton DK which will keep you beautifully cool, and with 56 shades to choose from, you can create a rainbow all your own.

As sweet as a scoop of Neapolitan ice cream, this beautiful The Neapolitan Drip Sweater makes good use of the spike stitch - it's so easy to do, and creates such a fun effect. This fun jumper comes in three sizes, S, M and L, and is crocheted above in We Are Knitters The Cotton Wool, which is a gorgeous cotton DK yarn, but you can substitute your favourite cotton DK yarn.

This fabulous Slide Tank Top is a clever use of short rows - and the pattern contains a photo tutorial about how to construct and use short rows to achieve this fantastic zig zag of sections. The yarn use here is a cotton called Plymouth Yarns Bio Bimbo, but any cotton 4ply (fingering) weight yarn will work.

Every designer should have a Goldenrod Sweater up their sleeve - here it is, a sweater that has been extremely popular thanks to its wonderful puff stitch detail and wonderful sleeves. This fabulous sweater with its top down, seamless construction won our Pattern of the Month competition earlier this year, for good reason - and we've seen quite a few completed Goldenrod sweaters popping up in the Community too.

This gloriously big Tilda Shawl is generous enough to disappear into - and yet created from just one ball of Caron Cakes! It uses short rows, puff stitches and although it looks simple, it is marked intermediate/advanced because it requires careful reading as you go along. We think it's definitely worth the attention.