This month’s review is yet again another hand knitting book but an excellent resource for machine knitting. The book is 200 Fair Isle Motifs by Mary Jane Mucklestone . This book has a photo of knitted swatches with corresponding charts. There is a black and white chart stating stitches and rows, a color chart for the knitted swatch shown, another color chart with a color variation idea, and also a chart showing the pattern repeat.
Charts are in order by row and stitch count starting with the smallest charts first. The motifs will all work on a 24 stitch punchcard. Many motifs are small and would be great for cuffs, socks, and other small projects. You can, of course, combine many motifs for an all over patterned Fair Isle project. What I love about this book is that each motif is shown knitted. You can find this book used or new from your favorite book shop.
I am going to review some books I find to be great resources for machine knitting. I have tons of old machine knitting books, but I realize knitters do not always have access to the old out of print books. There are many newer books which are great resources. First book up for review is Selbu Patterns by Bardsgard.
Selbu Patterns is a large, heavy, hardcover, coffee table style book. The photography is great. It is printed on thick glossy paper. It even has a satin ribbon book marker. The book is for hand knitting, but it is mostly charts which translate well to machine. Some designs are small repeats which would work on a punchcard, while other designs are very large and cover half a cardigan. All designs/charts show several repeats (not written out as one repeat of the pattern), so if you are making a punchcard, you will have to break the design down to a single repeat to fit.
The book starts out with a very short section about the history of knitting in Norway. This is followed by a collection of master patterns (socks, hats, sweaters). The master patterns are written out for hand knitting. There are no schematics or line drawings showing the item/measurements.
The majority of Selbu Patterns is knitting design/charts. These charts can easily be imported into Designaknit Graphics Studio and used for machine knitting your own personal knits. Many of the motifs are quite small and would work great for mittens, socks, and smaller items. It is easy to mix and match designs to your own liking. Some designs are slight variations of others, but overall, I think it is a great book to add to your library.
Lots of knitting going on here but I haven’t had time to blog. I hope you are also getting lots of knitting done! I have a quick shawl pattern to share. I knit the shawl on the Passap E6000, but you can use any double bed electronic knitting machine and Designaknit. I have included the Wincrea .bmp file too.
This pattern was made from necessity. I needed a quick shawl for a trip I was going on. I literally designed, knit, and washed the shawl a few hours before I was leaving on my trip . Finished width 24″. Finished length 71.” I knit mine in black and light grey so it would go with everything. I added the KNIT text on the borders, but you could delete the text if you don’t want it on yours… You could also shorten the borders on the top and bottom if you wanted to cut off some length…the borders are 4″ on each end if you are knitting in 2/30 yarn.
Machine set up is 80 stitches (40-0-40) double bed and total of 1000 lock passes on the row counter (250 pattern rows). The files are for Designaknit and Wincrea. I knit mine on Passap E6000 knitting machine in double bed jacquard T186. This is a double bed tuck technique which results in a wide width. (If you knit on a different machine or with a different technique, it may end up narrower and shorter.) I used 2 strands 2/30 (2 strands/cones of each color). Both end needles go on the back bed with T186. Tension for cast on 4. Knit tension 4.3. I do use a comb and weight with the T186 tuck pattern.
I have the .stp Designaknit file and Wincrea .bmp file on my Dropbox for you to download. Click HERE to access the files. (You can knit this with 2 strands 2/24 (double strands each color) or one strand (each color) 2/17. (The 2/17 lambswool from Uppingham is nice for UK knitters). Thicker yarn will make a wider/longer shawl if knit with T186.) Also for a wool option in USA, Jaggerspun 2/18 works single strand and the Jaggerspun Heathers 2/8. I do not find the 2/8 to be itchy. It is cheaper than the 2/18 Merino and I love the Heathers colors. You may knit this pattern and sell your knits. Please do not share the files but direct people to my blog for them to download. Thank you.
