Designing a cover for my latest gadget

How it will look. Almost.

In January I treated myself to an Asus Transformer Prime - we all deserve a present in the middle of winter, right? And, well, I love it. It’s just so useful, so easy to carry around and it comes with a keyboard so I can get lots of writing done will away from my laptop, which is pretty much all weekend, every weekend these days. I can take photos, read books, read the blogs I’m following, keep up with Twitter and Facebook and even play the occasional game. As you could probably guess I’m something of a fan.

But, of course, this makes it imperative that my shiny new purchase remains shiny and unscratched, which means only one thing - the chance to design a cover. I decided to go for crochet rather than knitting this time, as I’ve been rather neglecting the former craft. Also, fabric made from double crochet is generally tighter, and therefore more protective, than knitted material.

For the yarn I wanted something hardwearing and not too expensive as the cover is going to spend most of its time in or being pulled from bags, getting dirty and and scrunched up in the process. I also wanted something chunky so it would make up nice and quickly. I’ve got loads of Sirdar Click in my stash, and this acrylic/wool mix was ideal.

In progress. Here you can see the ribbed effect of
crocheting only through the back loop.

Of course I didn’t want a plain cover, so I chose two colours I thought would match nicely - cream and lilac - and got striping. Now a lot of knitters and crocheters avoid stripes because of all the ends that’ll need sewing in. But there’s a trick to that: don’t cut the yarn. Instead run it along the edge of the fabric, simply bringing the colour into use at the right time. Then you just hide the strands in the joining. It’s the same technique as in fair isle or intarsia.

Striping wasn’t the only interest though. By only inserting the hook through the back loop of each double crochet I created a ribbed fabric that’s lovely to look at and feel and has lots of stretch. That stretchiness means the fabric isn’t really suitable for lining, but using double crochet and a chunky yarn should ensure that the stitches stay tight and thick enough to provide all the protection Optimus needs (it’s a Transformer Prime; of course I called it Optimus).

A close up of the striped ribbing.

Once the cover was slightly bigger than the tablet, I tied off, folded the piece in half and loosely slip stitched all the way around - including the folded edge so it would match the other side, but not the top.

I’m now in the process of creating an envelope-style flap with a buttonhole to secure it and slip stitched around the edges, again to make it match the rest and to hide the stranded bits of yarn. The finished piece should look a bit like a document folder.

Of course I’m thinking of variations. Something similar, but in a brown yarn, crocheting through both loops, a square flap rather than shaped and buckles instead of a button would create a satchel-style cover that could then be lined.

This cover is for a 10” Asus Transformer tablet, but the pattern could easily be adapted for any tablet or eReader - simply adjust the number of chain stitches at the beginning.

You can just see the flap taking shape here.