Knitter's Stash: Favorite Patterns from America's Yarn Shops [Hardcover]

Barbara Albright (Editor), Melanie Falick (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 28, 2001

What today’s knitters love even more than knitting is visiting their local yarn shops and stocking up on new ideas, patterns, and tons of yarn. This collection of 30 patterns chosen from hundreds of entries submitted by yarn shops across the country is full of personal stories, knitting wisdom, and favorite tips from the people who have helped fuel today’s knitting revolution. The patterns range from designer sweaters and kids’ knits to small take-along projects. More than a pattern book, this delightful collection is like a trip to the yarn shop, a private session with the best knitters around, and a friendly chat with the country’s most passionate knitters all rolled into one.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Imagine browsing through the nation's top yarn shops and chatting with owners about the projects that most appeal to their customers, how they got into the yarn business, and what they have learned about knitting through the years. Then imagine including everything you've learned along with 33 original patterns from 33 local yarn shops in a richly illustrated pattern compendium. The result would be Knitter's Stash. Featured here are stores throughout the country from Bette Bornside's shop in New Orleans to My Yarn Shop in Coos Bay to Countrywool in Hudson, NY, to Rumpelstiltskin in Sacramento. And for the knitter who likes to travel and what knitter doesn't? there is a comprehensive directory of yarn stores all over the United States. Highly recommended for all knitting collections.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

What does it take to make a knitter happy? A rainbow of colors and textures, intriguing and challenging designs, and, most important, a knitwear shop owner who is knowledgeable, sympathetic, and open to customers. All those winning elements form the basis of Albright's guide. More than 30 yarn shop proprietors contribute their favorite patterns, tips, and ideas. The designs span ages and seasons and difficulty levels (though none are so indicated); an easy-to-make classic tank top for summer, for example, contrasts sharply with a whimsical felt tea cozy. No matter whether an item is for wear or display, the pattern features color photographs, instructions, and great tips, from the best way to knit a sample swatch to setting in sleeves. Glossary, abbreviations, stitches, store directory, supplier list, and gauge chart appended. Barbara Jacobs
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 180 pages
• Publisher: Interweave Press (September 28, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1883010896
• ISBN-13: 978-1883010898
• Product Dimensions: 10.3 x 10 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #549,314 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

139 of 141 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Inspiring techniques and designs of all kinds, October 28, 2001

By 

Cat Bordhi (San Juan islands, Washington) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Knitter's Stash: Favorite Patterns from America's Yarn Shops (Hardcover)

When I saw this book in my local yarn store, I began to leaf through it and within a minute knew I wanted it. It is one of those beautiful coffee table knitting books, like Knitting Across America, which make every knitting cell in your body tingle and shift into the ready-set-knit position. Still, I will only buy a book if there are at least two or three patterns or techniques in it that I do not want to miss. This book (which is a collection of favorite patterns from yarn shops across the country) has many more than three. It includes everything from a baby outfit and children's sweaters and a tea cozy to a felted bag that is unlike any of the other wonderful felted bags that have been appearing in magazines lately. There are intricate intarsia and Fair Isle sweaters, simple cardigans with easy, yet pleasing details to entice even the most accomplished knitter, a lovely pair of socks, a Celtic Cardigan, felted tropical fish (a great way to try felting, as they really do not have to fit anyone), linen washcloths, two rugs, a shawl, and men's sweaters. Oh yes, and a hat. If you've spent the last few years gazing adoringly and longingly at the line drawings of sweaters in Amazing Threads' ads, but have never been quite ready to order a kit, in this book you'll find a section about their wonderful store as well as a Lace Ribs Pullover by Jacqueline Olsen, their master designer. The sweater features her trademark seamless saddle shoulder construction, and you could work from these directions to design your own similar sweater. She has also "unvented" a lacy bind-off and a cast-on, both elastic (as in stretchy, but without the use of real elastic) and attractive, featured in this sweater. It is just these sorts of details that make me buy books. Another exquisite design is the Cable-Wise Cashmere from L'Atelier. The carefully placed lines of wishbone cables on this graceful, elegant pullover incorporate elements of a medieval maiden's gown into a modern, sleek knitted garment. I shall probably knit it, although not in cashmere. I do wish the book could have included charts for all patterns that have textured designs, but I understand why it does not. Publishing costs rise with each additional page, particularly in a book as thick, colorful, and beautifully laid out as this one. There are charts for the designs that really need them, and readers would do well to buy some graph paper, sharpen a pencil, and take a look at the charts on page 13, where they will find symbols they can use to draw their own charts. If you draw your own chart from written row directions, you will really understand designs before beginning your knitting, and will develop into a more confident, grounded knitter and may become an independent designer yourself.

35 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Knitter's Stash is a beautiful book you will treasure!, September 8, 2002

By 

Sheri Smith (Spin2Knit in E. Tennessee) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Knitter's Stash: Favorite Patterns from America's Yarn Shops (Hardcover)

I have been working on this review for a long time...
Frankly, I kept getting distracted by the patterns and forgeting to write the review.
I'd read something and have to try it. Or think..... I wonder how this would look in Hand Spun Yarn and have to try that, too.
I also wanted to read every detail of the book, not just work the patterns. And the photographs sent me off on daydreaming tangents. It is one of those books that you devour from cover to cover and have a hard time putting down.
This book is especially dear to me as I do not have a local yarn shop close to me.
While I might be able to reproduce the yarn styles with my own handspinning, I cannot replace the atmosphere that exists in these wonderful places. Reading it made me fondly remember how much I really love yarn shops and all the people who work and frequent them.
I have also visited some of the shops mentioned and have come to know other shops and owners via this wonderful worldwide internet. In addition, I felt like I was being introduced to the others as I read this book--glancing at a piece of their daily lives and actually getting to visit their shops even though I might be thousands of miles away.
The photography is beautiful, the biographies interesting, the patterns amazing!
What more could you ask for in a book?
A list of shops in every state? The Knitter's Stash has that, too--listed by state and city.
Tips? This wonderful book has them scattered throughout. It even includes instructions from Claudia Krisniski of Countrywool on using a Handspindle to make your own yarn and instructions in a couple of the patterns for felting/fulling knit items.
These tips from the people who encounter a wide variety of knitting on a daily basis are really very enlightening.Ê
With the exception of the Angora Handspun yarn from Countrywool, all the patterns in the book call for commercial yarns. It is to be noted though, that all of them could easily be adapted using the gauge information, needle recommendations and suggested yarn substitutions recommended. Most of the patterns feature styles made from textured yarns or designer yarns just like those created by handspinning.
An interesting chart at the end of the book which I have not seen in any books before is one which lists the gauge first and then indexes the patterns using that gauge with the page numbers they can be found on--a unique and useful idea!
The Knitter's Stash features patterns for sweaters, afghans, a tea cozy, hats, mittens, scarves, shawls, baby items, toys, washcloths, rugs and pillows plus much more. It would be a widely varied adventure to knit through this book from cover to cover!

29 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Buyer Beware of this Beautiful Book, March 6, 2005

By 

tania (Atlanta, GA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Knitter's Stash (Paperback)

This book, while beautiful to look at, has many errors. The publisher's web site contains an errata and should be looked at before any of the projects are begun.
On another note, I did make the My Constant Companion bag and enjoyed it tremendously. The bag gets a lot of compliments.