Review: Color by Kristin

Yesterday, I received an order from Amazon (UPS loves me!) with this latest book from color-expert Kristin Nicholas.  Color by Kristin: How to Design Your Own Beautiful Knits is a feast for the eyes and gets my knitting thoughts going.   This is the kind of book I would love to write ... where I can play with color and create gorgeous masterpieces and help others do the same.

Yep, that's what Nicholas has accomplished in this 170+ page book.

Ever since I was little, I've loved knitting with multiple colors.  Even with the early, plastic-y acrylics (that were in colors not exactly from the natural world), I would knit COLOR!  Partially this was due to my need to reuse/recycle from not having a lot of the "ready" to buy fresh yarn.  For me, the process was the thing ... knitting or crocheting the item and then ripping to make something else were pretty standard procedure for me back then.

Now that I can afford to buy fresh yarn ... and even the natural "real" stuff ... I find that I am still using up bits from past projects, adding the spectrum to an otherwise dull design, creating beauty from the tints and tones available now.  Nicholas' book and knitting philosophy fits right in with this.  She loves color and rarely uses black or white as those make a design "too neutral".  She embellishes her two-color-per-row designs with simple embroidery stitches (often using duplicate stitch) to give greater depth and zing to the item.

And boy, does she do it well!

The book starts out with a chapter on the "Joy of Color", giving a brief description of the color-wheel (using yarn as the colors to help the knitter link the usually flat color wheel to real yarn), where to find color combinations (nature is one of the best and cheapest ways), and finally, the importance of swatching to test the colors.  This chapter gives the reader all she/he needs to begin exploring color.

Nicholas than goes on to explain two-stranded knitting in the round (many call it "Fair Isle" altho the technique transcends that small Scottish island), steeking and "dressing" (blocking and finishing treatments).  Starting on something small ... like a draft-blocker or child's sampler sweater will give the knitter the confidence to do a bigger project or even design their own 2-color pattern blocks.... which is where the third chapter comes in:  designing fair isle knits explains symmetry, graphing, simple to complex designs, etc.  There is a "designer sourcebook" in the back of the book, broken into stitch-multiples to get your graphing skills jump-started.

Next come the projects ... 25+ projects, otherwise known as knitter's eye-candy!

I'm not a direction-follower and rarely would do a pattern exactly from another designer.  That's just not in me.  But Nicholas' designs have me re-thinking that philosophy a bit.  Her designs are gorgeous but I can make them as described and STILL make them my own (by changing the color-stitch design ... or colorway ... or adding/deleting the embroidery embellishment).  And she has tips throughout these gorgeous items to get you designing on your own.

I especially like that Nicholas' designs are not limited to knit-wear ... she has pillows, chill-stoppers, and even an ottoman cover.  Photographed at her farm in Massachusetts, you can see that Nicholas designs what she loves and uses .... and that comes through in her writing, too.  If you love what you do, your enthusiasm transcends the page to reach the heart of the reader!

Now, I'm off to start collecting colors ... swatching ... and first, deciding which item I'm going to try first:  the over-the-top shawl ... slipper socks ... knitter's tote ... java jacket ... best friends pullovers ... laptop cozy ... southwest style sleeved wrap ... marrakesh market pillows ....

So much knitting ... so little time!  But GREAT Christmas gift ideas.

Happy knittin'

Mary C. Gildersleeve

By Hand, With Heart -- hand-knit designs
bhwh.mary@gmail.com

Review: New Stranded Colorwork

Today, we got a few boxes from Amazon (BamBam's birthday is the end of next month ...) and one of the books was actually for me ... and about knitting.  I just spent the last couple of hours since dinner reading this book ... drooling over this book ... and plotting my next project!

Mary Scott Huff's newest book, The New Stranded Colorwork: Techniques and Patterns for Vibrant Knitwear is an amazing mix of knitter's "eye candy", glorious and unique use of color and traditional/classic designs that mean that this book will be usable for a knitter for many years to come.

Personally, I bought the book because I fell in love with the pattern on the right front cover:  Norwegian Blue is a gorgeous combination of blues, taupe and a blaze of red!  Wow!

But as I first browsed through the book, I found many more beauties:  Timberline (which is knitted for a man, but I'd make it for myself!), Kjersten (a gorgeous jacket in green and black with accents of red and orange that look great rather than gaudy), Kiss that Frog (which would be a great sweater for one of my boys), the Johnny Jump-up Leg Warmers (which would be a perfect Christmas present for my little ballerina), the Bee's Knees (which , altho it's designed for a toddler, I would make for my String Bean who LOVES bees but I would change the border from sage green to a pretty pink), and the lovely, final design which is called Wedding Belle and is meant for the Bride once she realizes that the gorgeous gown she chose is a bit nippy and needs something other than her groom's jacket!  These are gorgeous.

The really cool thing about this book ... for me, who can't follow directions/rules to save my life ... is that the design motifs are charted.  So, I can lift a piece from here and an element from there, with a color scheme from another and I've got a unique sweater or hat or leggings or socks or whatever!

I also love that she's got very clear and concise directions for the techniques she's used throughout.  And some of these techniques are extremely unique to Ms. Huff -- she suggests making two sleeves at one time by casting on the sleeve stitches together, with steeks between and then slicing, sewing and finishing off the sleeves!  Genius!  She also clearly describes how to add the traditional (but optional) ribbon bands to the sliced fronts and recommends a certain kind of thread that "buries itself into the knitting without kinking" -- cool, huh?

I do have one small quibble ... the Koi Vest (that's shown on the front left cover) hasn't been finished properly ... the armhole flares out and should pull-in (either a case of the shoulder sts not being slanted properly or the facing band being too thick -- either way, a detail that should have been rectified especially as it is featured on the cover ). 

Also, the felted bag that is shown on the front cover is an oddity that doesn't fit with the other designs -- a case of "which of these items doesn't go with the others"?  It's a very funkey design, with its flower appliques and neon color scheme while all the others are classic styles with colorwork that, well ... works! 

Hmmm ... I wonder what they were thinking?

Even those couple of designs aside ... check out this book -- it really is a great addition to my knitting library!


Happy knittin'

Mary C. Gildersleeve
By Hand, With Heart -- hand-knit designs
bhwh.mary@gmail.com

Color: now this is cool

Thanks to a mention on Mia's One Hour Craft blog, I have found a very cool site! Have you ever wondered what combination of stripes would look best? How many rows of one color and another and another? Would the red really look good close to the yellow?

Well, the Stripe Generator from KissYourShadow. Kiss Your Shadow is an online journal and if you click her home page -- well, you just better have a full belly because she has pictures of some of the most gorgeous food you'll ever want to try! Click on her crafts link and you'll see some of her knitting as well as other crafts.

But back to the Stripe Generator -- you click on as many colors as you want, how many rows for stripes (you can click one number or every number). The program that generates a random mix of stripes in the colors and numbers you've chosen. If you don't like the first set, click F5 on your keyboard to refresh the screen and get a newly generated mix ... VERY COOL! She also then has a text box that gives you the "directions" for obtaining the picture.

I tried to do a screen capture but was unable to do so. Just go play with it ... you'll see what I mean by the coolness of it all!