Techniques: Italian cast-on and bind-off using two-colours

The Italian cast-on method is an invisible cast-on, because it creates no edge (the chain you see in the long-tail cast-on, for example). It is a very elastic cast-on which makes it the perfect cast-on for two-colour Brioche knitting and also for double knitting (see the video below). I am currently working on a very simple two colour brioche cowl and, even though it meant learning a new technique, I had to use this cast-on because the result is simply far superior to what you get with another cast-on. The good news is that this is really easy to learn.

Another great advantage of using the Italian cast-on is that there is a perfectly matching bind-off. This is a sewn bind-off and is really well worth learning, because it is the also used to bind-off standard ribbing. This bind-off has many different names in the literature and you may know it as the tubular or invisible bind-off (named that way because it is a perfect match to the tubular cast-on too).

The above video shows how to work it in one-colour, but this is done exactly in the same way in two. Another important piece of information the video does not mention is that you need a pretty long tail, 4 or 5 times longer than the width of your knitting. Also, this technique depends crucially on which is the first stitch on your needle, a knit (in the video above) or a purl stitch (in the video below).