1000 Great Knitting Motifs [Paperback]

Luise Roberts (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 5, 2004

Let's say you want to personalise or embellish an existing knitting pattern. Perhaps it's a plain sweater and you want to add edging to the cuffs or put a sunflower or an aeroplane motif on the pocket of a child's cardigan or incorporate a textured stitch, such as Fair Isle, to the yoke of a knitted jacket...the possibilities for embellishment are endless. 1000 Great Knitting Motifs will help you choose a colourful stitch pattern and/or motifs to create a unique garment. To help whittle down the huge number of options, stitch patterns suitable for children are flagged with a little icon. Each chart comes with data indicating the number of stitches and the number of rows required to repeat a single pattern. Repeats are shown on the charts. Some charts are shown in different colourways. There are 1000-charted motifs to pick, from traditional ones used by knitters from Northern Europe to the Middle East to new classics from around the world. Use a favourite pattern but change the look so it can be worn on a different occasion. Add an icon, a pretty flower or a symbol to suit the wearer's character, and design the perfect birthday gift for a loved one that will be cherished for years.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Luise Roberts was taught at an early age by her mother how to knit and sew. However, it was with a degree in graphic design and earning a living designing books, in particular several knitting books, that rekindled her interest in knitting. With a new enthusiasm and fresh ideas, she is keen to convey this passion to others. Luise lives in London.

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Collins & Brown (July 5, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1843400928
• ISBN-13: 978-1843400929
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 7.2 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,919,235 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Features 1000 charted motifs to chose from, November 11, 2004

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: 1000 Great Knitting Motifs (Spiral-bound)

There plenty of yarns and patterns for knitters, but 1000 Great Knitting Motifs by Luise Roberts is the one pattern guide guaranteed to please all levels and styles of knitter. It features 1000 charted motifs to chose from - and not just Western, either: motifs from the Middle East and other parts of the world deftly separate 1000 Great Knitting Motifs from its largely-Western competitors. Add a number of categories which deftly lend themselves to both browsing and quick reference and you have a comprehensive needlecraft library reference including color charts to encourage knowledgable design variations and you have a real reference winner - complete with lay-flat binding for practical access while knitting.

28 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars fairly useful book, very useless binding, July 23, 2005

By 

Med Student (Dayton, OH) - See all my reviews

This review is from: 1000 Great Knitting Motifs (Spiral-bound)

Overall, I'd say this is a fairly decent pattern book. I bought it to use for designing market bags for the women in my family. I plan on using the argyle pattern (which is excellent), but out of 1,000 motifs, that's the only one I'll be using.

This book essentially works on the principle of quantity over quality. I'd say about half of the patterns are actually not very good at all, and pretty much all of the rest I'm not interested in due to personal preference. But there are just so many offered that you still have a decent chance of finding what you're looking for.

My biggest complaint is that the patterns are not modern enough. I liked the argyle because that is an older pattern that came back into vogue a couple of years ago, making it the most current pattern in the book. Since most of the women that I am knitting for have a very modern put-together look that I didn't find in this book, I will still be making my own stripe and color block patterns for most of the bags. Most of the 'modern' patterns in the book are geared toward children (alphabet, toys, flowers, insects, animals, etc).

The only reason that I consider this book pretty good is that fair isle is one of the most enduring pattern styles that I know of. If you're a fan of traditional fair isle patterns, then this is probably a good book for you. I'm sure that there are lots of fair isle fans that could get great use out of this book. There are also ethnic patterns sorted by area of origin, but the fair isle section is by far the largest.

The binding really is awful. The cover pictured is actually a cardboard binder that the book is not really attached to. It has little holes in the inside that the spiral binding of the book is supposed to slip into, but good luck using the book with it attached to the cover. It wasn't even attached when I received it in the mail and I've since made peace with the cover remaining unattached. That the spiral binding won't even keep the pages together when I flip through the book is a much bigger problem. The publisher might as well have just sent the pages in the mail with no binding at all for as well as the binding they used actually works.

49 of 55 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars 1000 graphs and 5 Photos, August 2, 2004

By 

sfknitter (San Francisco) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: 1000 Great Knitting Motifs (Spiral-bound)

This is a nice size book but disappointingly, comprised almost entirely of graphs. There ought to have been more (than the five photos) included along side some of the graphs to let you know how the motifs may come out. There is some explanations and ideas provided but that is on the light side too. If you still think you might like to get this book, I'd recommend taking a look at it first.