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62 of 63 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Introducing felt into your knitting, June 4, 2007
This review is from: Knitting Never Felt Better: The Definitive Guide to Fabulous Felting (Hardcover)
Following in the footsteps of her bestselling series on edge treatments, Nicky Epstein now lends her signature style to felting. In Knitting Never Felt Better: the definitive guide to fabulous felting, Epstein, a self-professed "felting freak," provides more than 150 before and after swatches and a variety of patterns using felting techniques and fabrics.
The first twenty swatches show how various fibers (wool, alpaca, cashmere) and fiber blends react to the felting process. Epstein then illustrates how lace, cables, various colorwork methods can be incorporated into felting to produce unique results. As with her previous guides, the swatches are large and the photographs show details clearly. Each group of swatches is knit in the same color, enabling the reader to focus on the stitches rather than having their eyes distracted by the yarn color.
What raises this to the level of an exceptional guide are her trademark touches. An entire section is devoted to dimensional felting described by her as: "performing a magic trick: A piece of plain, flat stockinette stitch takes on a three-dimensional quality. You perform this sleight of hand by inserting a shrink-resistant object into the piece before felting." Epstein then takes this technique and uses beads, embroidery and felted leaves to create grape clusters and 3-D flowers, as shown on the cover of the book.
The final third of Knitting Never Felt Better is dedicated to the special touches knitters associate with Epstein's work: appliques and embellishments, as well as templates for decorative items that can be cut from felted wool (a great way to use up swatches and felting mistakes!) and tips on transforming old clothes into felted toys, baby items and accessories. Throughout the volume, Epstein incorporates helpful tips from her readers and she even polled sixty yarn shop owners to create a top ten list of favorite yarns for felting.
Armchair Interviews says: If you've ever contemplated felting, this volume will quickly indoctrinate you into the addictive realm of felting.
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63 of 66 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
For serious felters, June 13, 2007
This review is from: Knitting Never Felt Better: The Definitive Guide to Fabulous Felting (Hardcover)
Here's the dish about the book.
1. There are great before and after felting photos in many different stich patterns including lace. Even if you do not want to felt the pattern you can see what it looks like without felting.
2. There are before and after pictures of simple stockinette stiches in a variety of yarn
3. You are told how many time to wash the wool to get to the felted look you want.
4. Demension felting is one of the major sections of this book and the author suggest several options for tool to use for deminsional felting. To me this was the most inovative and inspiration portion of the book.
5. The book is beautiful just to look at over and over again.
Caution-
If you are beginer many of the patterns will require the guidence of a more experienced knitter.
Like her previous books, it is an inspirational book to help you design; not a pattern book. Another reason it may not be for the beginer knitter.
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33 of 34 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Nicky Epstein has done it again!, May 28, 2007
This review is from: Knitting Never Felt Better: The Definitive Guide to Fabulous Felting (Hardcover)
As an experienced knitter/felter, I looked over this book uncertain that it would have much to teach me. Boy, was I wrong. Like her "Edge" series, this book is mostly about techniques and applications in the form of swatches and stitch patterns.
This book has sections on basic felting and different fiber types, shibori style and dimensional felting, cables and mosaic patterns, all with swatches that show before and after felting. She has some patterns for garments and other felted items, and while I'm not sure all are for me, all are creative and beautiful examples of the techniques described in the book.
If you're just looking for a book of patterns for felted knits, this is probably not the one for you. If you are looking for one to spark ideas and demonstrate stitch patterns you might not have thought to use on felted items, this book would make a great addition to any knitting library.
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