Customer Reviews

The Handspinner's Companion

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This book, published in Australia, contains a wealth of essential Information for spinners and is useful for knitters who want to understand yarn as well. Topics covered include an analysis and characteristics of yarns intended for knitters; properties, characteristics, grading, analysis, selection and preparation of fleeces and fiber from common fiber animals; yarn design and spinning methods; washing raw fiber and yarns; knitting with specific yarns; blending of fibers and characteristics to consider; plying methods for various numbers of plies, colors, special effects and variations; and color and dyeing principles and methods for fiber and yarn. Specific fibers discussed include alpaca, angora, cashmere, cashgora, cotton, flax, mohair, silk and wool. It even details exactly how to fasten line flax to a distaff for spinning. Illustrations are line art, and tables summarize comparison data.

All the material is very clearly and concisely presented, mainly in outline form, making it easy to read and reference, unique in books of this type. There is a six page Table of Contents, making the content very easy to find. The book has one glitch in the printing: the lower case "w" in the italic subhead font did not print, but left a blank space wherever it should be. Once the reader realizes that the missing character is a "w" it becomes less distracting.

Thie Handspinner's Companion is a book that would be well used in any spinner's library, a go-to resource to be referenced time and again, full of practical information, and ageless. I highly recommend it!