It's small, and the cover is downright weird, but this book features a dozen of the most imaginative sweaters I have ever seen. The designers mixed and matched lace, colorwork, ribbons, and cables to create dazzling designs for the, ah, adventurous knitter.
This sweater is a composite of fluffy lace stitches. The detail is hard to see in the small pix, but you can click the pix for a larger view. I can see it knit in a variety of mohair yarns--plain and subtle colorways.
I crave this sweater--it's colorful without being blatant and the ribbonwork detail on the sleeves is elegant and inspired. I've been toying with the idea of incorporating a bit of this into a pair of socks just to see how well it works in practice.
Even if you never make a single sweater from the directions, the unique ideas presented here can easily be incorporated into sweater designs written in English. but don't forget that all the designs inside are charted. However, only a single size is given, and I would be that all of them would be too small for the average Westerner.
The book is available from Amazon Japan, but I couldn't find it on Yes Asia. The ASIN number is 427711251X.
Tuesday, January 2, 2007
An Unusual Japanese Knitting Book
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8 comments:
Do you have these books In Real Life, or are you looking at the pictures online? The mohair sweater reminds me a little of some of the fluffy Phildar designs from the 80's.
I only review books that I actually own. Otherwise, how could I review it...not much in the library here, that's for sure!
Thanks for this, Fleegle. How exciting -- worth the book for the pictures alone, methinks. It truly is inspirational. Did you buy it online or through some mysterious source.
Jane
Do you have instructions for the ribbonwork?
That closeup... Oooh, it would look fantastic on socks!
Sweet! The Japanese stuff is really interesting. It's cool that you have the magazines/books on hand!
And when I said Phildar designs in the 80's, I actually meant the Anny Blatt designs in the 80's. I am a big idiot.
Fleegle, is there a good place online to browse and buy interesting Japanese knitting books? I've tried looking on YesAsia but am having difficulty coming up with anything...
Cheers from your KR friend cabbagehead
Sort of. Instead of typing in "knitting," try typing "amimono." You will get a selection of knitting books, and then you will have to use something like Babelfish to translate the description.
Babelfish is here: http://babelfish.altavista.com/tr
Short of a trip to Japan, that's about the best you can do.
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