Customer Reviews

Japanese Inspired Knits (Marianne Isager Collection)

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This collection of knits by Marianne Isager is Japanese-inspired but not completely given over to designs that are completely Oriental.

The book is organized by month, and a different, seasonally-appropriate design is featured. There is everything from textured knitting, lace and colorwork.

One pattern, a swing coat, cleverly imitates Japanese traditional indigo, with a sort of double ikat pattern woven in. The dark blue knitted in wave motifs on a blue background and looks like the fuzzy double-ikat weaving. And the coat is elegant in shape as well.

There is also a moon pattern with a motif like "shadow knitting" which is alternating color bands and garter stitch, a sort of eye-teasing, flickering design. This is a very plain flat pullover, but the moons make it special.

A beaded flower bud design looks like the slightly ditzy, but girly designs you see in Japanese knitting magazines. The beaded-bud pattern uses a blob of garter stitch along a row of color to make a very pleasant effect on light yarn.

The sizes in this book tend to the s-m-l and not many are extra-extra large, so if you are knitting for an extra-large person, many of these patterns will need to be adapted or are simply not suitable for a big physique. For example, there is a Fan Jacket, with a fascinating construction (knit from the underarm in radiating increased garter stitch-ending in rounded lace at the lapels.) This goes up to size 44 but no larger and it's a very pretty jacket indeed but you would have to knit it in a different gauge to try to make it larger; adapting it would be very difficult.

The best thing about this book are the shapes of the garments, which are creative. The designs are not knock-your-eyes-out fabulous, but they have a subtlety that is worth a second and third and in some cases, many more looks.

I understand that with so many knitting books coming out, it's not a bad idea for an author to have some kind of a hook. But these patterns are "Japanese-inspired" the way Ashton Kutcher is a Kabbalist. At best it's a case of marketing over matter, at worst it's yet another case of co-opting. That all the knits are modeled by a white girl with tastefully straightened black hair doesn't help with the cringe factor. While the patterns are good practices for various techniques and may be to many people's tastes, their supposed provenance is firmly of the Pier 1 Imports school of thought--they only look Japanese to people with no familiarity with the culture and are happy to fill in the massive blanks with superficial, possibly quaint, ideas.

Harsh? Sure, but what do you expect when you tart up a standard cable sweater with a name like "Sake and Soba" and stick characters for "Autumn", "Red" and "Winter" together on a page like they make any kind of a sense as a single word? Oh I'm sorry, you meant that to be just exotic-looking page decoration? I'm sure it'd make a great tattoo too, on anyone who can't read it, that is.

Bottom line, I would emphatically *not* recommend the book for those who are genuinely interested in infusing their knitting with traditional Japanese garment construction, motifs or colors, or with contemporary Japanese styling.

I knit every day. Sometimes I think it's a habit and not a hobby. This book inspired me to do something more than 'another pair of socks'. The designs are beautiful, though not for a beginner or even an advanced beginner, more like an advanced intermediate level. The instructions assume a lot of knitting knowledge and experience. If you want a book to inspire you to greater things, this book could do the trick. It was fine for me, but a friend who borrowed it spent hours at the local knit shop, sitting in the 'help' corner. Also, for those of you on a budget, all the patterns use a great deal of yarn. To spend the time making these beautiful garments would be a waste without using really nice yarn. A typical piece in the book, when using fine yarn, could be more than $200.

There are many beautiful japanese pattern books out there so I was excited to see the patterns in this book. I was woefully disappointed! First of all, the designs feel like they are straight out of the 80's--large geographic prints and mosaics combined with wide shoulders that decrease steadily to a narrow waist.

Second, the sizing in this book is terrible. Most of the patterns have 2-3 sizes available and the range doesn't extend very small or very large. A few of the patterns go up to a 43-44.

All in all, I would highly recommend you try to get a look at this book before purchasing it because the patterns will only appeal (taste-wise) to a select few.

This book presents just what its title says: knits that the designer produced inspired by some aspect of Japanese art and culture. It isn't about Japanese knitting or Japanese design.

There is nothing wrong or strange about such an endeavor. European artists have been inspired by Japanese culture for centuries, & produced perfectly genuine European art based on that inspiration. I assume the reverse process occurs in Japan, & is also legitimate.

The biggest value for me in this book is the interesting design and knitting technique in every piece. It is a great resource for this reason. My one quibble with the book is that the diagrams are not always so very great for those who don't follow row by row instructions.

I bought the book for the fan jacket pattern, which is indeed very clever and interesting to knit. I ended up liking a number of the other patterns as well, especially the rice fields and the carp.

As A.S. Kaku points out so correctly, this is not a recipe book about traditional Kimono, or how to correctly wear a traditional Kimono. There are several books already out there which do that.

This is a book about knitting, from a very well-known and respected knitwear designer, who shows examples of how to combine some Japanese style and Japanese elegance with day-to-day usability.

Of course the model is a white girl - the target audience is not exclusively Japanese women. The target audience are people worldwide who already know that a Japanese Kimono looks best on a kneeling Japanese woman. What is of interest, though, for the target audience is 'can I wear that one to work?'.

The knits in this book are interesting, wearable, and have chic. They are Japanese enough to make me smile, and they are usable enough that I can wear them to drive a car (try that with an Obi!), or run up a staircase if I want to. The mechanics of the construction are unusual enough to keep me interested, and the materials and colours are adaptable to me and my style.

All in all, I think this is a valuable book, and I can fully recommend it to adventurous knitters all over the world.

Japanese Inspired Knits (Marianne Isager Collection) is a book of twelve sweaters. The book contains a sweater a month, and each sweater expresses how the designer feels about the seasons and celebrations in Japan. Although there is a lot of garter stitch in the patterns there is also some fairly complicated shaping technique in the book, that will delight the accomplished or advanced knitter. The designs showcase shaping that is very flattering to all sizes and show fashion in knitting has moved away from the boxy look completely.

The twelve designs are fresh and interesting and the book layout is very clear. Each pattern is shown with a picture, and drawings showing the shaping. In addition, my favorite part of the book is a very nice notes section that accompanies each pattern. It is always a good idea to read through the pattern before starting to see what is coming and to make notes of simultaneous instructions or tricky bits. In this book Ms. Isager takes it a step further to provide an overview of the sweater and how it all starts, continues and finishes up. In addition, the notes explain, the shaping of the sweater and note if the drawing is not to scale to illustrate the instructions in the notes. If something is particularly complicated the note section for each sweater explains the process in advance so as to not trip up the unsuspecting knitter.

If there is a specific technique, such as intarsia, stranded knitting, entrelac, or double knitting there is an additional special section showing how that technique is done. The technique is shown with pictures and instructions to help the knitter along.

Between the lovely pictures, the special notes sections, the notes included with each pattern and the clear instructions these patterns are very well done. (As a caveat there are two pages with corrections on the publisher site. Make sure to download those before starting a project.)

I'm not sure this is a book for the beginner, but heck a person can dream can't they.

I used to live in Japan so this book immediately caught my eye. The Fair Isle pullover inside was everything I had been looking for, made with soft fingering weight yarn, beautiful argyle inspired patterning, and a wonderful blend of soft muted colors. I ordered the yarn for the pattern, from the author's own yarn line (Isager 2/50% alpaca, 50% merino wool, made in Peru) and it was also everything I had hoped for, very high quality yarn at a very reasonable price for the quality. From what I understand the yarns are dyed with natural colors which are very pleasing to the eye compared to chemical dyed yarn. The photos of Japan are really really special. Bty, this author is the same author of Knitting out of Africa.

Great book am already knitting "The Fan" and "Rice Fields" will be next. Own her "Knitting out of Africa" - excellent and have her next book on order.

Inspired by the seasonal festivals and traditions of Japan, Marianne Isager's Japanese Inspired Knits blends Scandinavian knitting with a Japanese influence to provide designs based on Japanese ideals of quality. Some 12 sweaters are seasonally inspired and offer an outstanding selection perfect for any needlework library seeking original and unusual ideas. All levels of needleworker will find plenty of easy inspiration in these creative techniques perfect for both specific crafting libraries and general-interest collections.