Customer Reviews

Luxury Yarn One-Skein Wonders: 101 Small Indulgences

5 star:		(39)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(16)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

This review is posted in proxy for my wife, a shepherdess and wool artist who specializes in lace knitting.
-edk

"Luxury Yarn One-Skein Wonders" contains lots of nice lace patterns that are fairly simple in execution but look great. I love knitting lace and can never get enough ideas for new patterns. The patterns in this book make really lovely projects as written but will also adapt well for personalized projects.

Charts, I was happy to see them! If you haven't knit lace from charts give it a try. I am always discouraged when a lace pattern is only written and I have to take the time to write a chart myself. Knitting from written directions makes my lace go screwy. Once you get over the intimidation of the look of a chart most people find them much easier.

I like the way the patterns are grouped by yarn weight, this means I can dig through my stash for a ball of leftover yarn and quickly find an idea for using it up. Knitting with luxury fibers is fun and any excuse to blow money on that amazing skein of cashmere works for me. But it's also nice to take that plain old boring half skin of grey wool and find something with a pretty texture to use it up on.

There are very few "dud" patterns in this book. Often I buy a pattern book for that one or two that I love and accept that 80% of the patterns are ugly or weird or just not something I would ever knit. Flipping through this book the first time I was pleasantly surprised to realize I would be willing to knit almost every single project. Also, there are few crochet patterns for the diverse fiber artists among us.

The patterns are fairly clear to read in terms of color and printing style. It's a little frilled out for my tastes, I like my patterns big, clear and straightforward, but for the most part they are not difficult to read. Also, the pictures are in one section the patterns in another. This works but does lead to flipping back and forth more than I would like.

... And then sadness. In the first pattern I tried I found a mistake right away. Not impressed! I took the pattern to two experienced knitting friends, paranoid that it wasn't a mistake but just me. They called it broken too. The pattern errors are printed on the publisher's web site[...] and when I looked I was surprised at how many were listed for this one book (unfortunately I couldn't find mine which means there's probably more than they are aware of). I have to send a strong ding to the publisher for not better vetting the patterns before publishing. Nothing is more irritating than sitting down in front of that Sunday afternoon movie wanting to whip off a quick pattern and having to rip out, get up and research the corrections before you can actually knit. So be forewarned you will have to puzzle through or get on-line. This makes this book probably not a great gift for a knitter who relies heavily on directions or is not comfortable with the internet.

My preference if for all knitting books to be published with a spiral bound spine which allows them to lie fully flat. In fact if I got my way, I would use a spiral spine that could be folded back on itself so you can lay it one page up at a time. First thing I did when knitting from this one is break the spine so it would lie flat in my lap. While I appreciate the trend to publish visually beautiful knitting books, pattern books are also a knitting tool and will be used, abused, doodled in and tossed around.

I really like this series of books and this one-skein approach, and this is another good one which would be a great source of knitted gift suggestions. Unfortunately, it suffers from some annoying book-design choices that affect usabililty.

I like practically all of the patterns, most of which are a bit on the refined side, with a bit of something special (except for the four bulky-weight patterns). There are many lacy and texture stitches. Except for a couple of baby items, none of the projects are playful or silly, and none have an in-your-face handmade look. (Depending on what you are looking for, is either good or bad.) Of course, your results may vary, for example, the Silk Delight Scarf looks special to me, but if it were made out of thick and thin funky colored yarn instead of luxury silk, it might look crafty instead. I like also having so many patterns in a single not-giant book, and I think I will get some good use of it.

One-skein projects are not necessarily quickly-made projects, because some skeins have lots of yardage (there is a lace stole which uses 875 yards of super-fine yarn). However, given the one-skein limitation, the projects generally are for accessories or baby/child sized items. There are 20 scarves and 13 hats, 8 gloves or wrist warmers, 9 purses or bags, 5 cowls, 4 socks, 3 shawls or stoles for adults. For babies there are 7 hats, 3 socks or booties, and various other items like a blanket, toy rabbit, 2 tops, etc. For adults there are a few spa items, a table mat, a vase cover, napkin rings, two necklaces, etc. There is one adult garment, a vest.

I like the way all the projects of the same weight are grouped together. Yarn weight ranges from super-fine to bulky, but 2/3 of the book seems to be lightweight, fine, or super-fine (more yardage in a skein).

Many of the patterns have charts, but just flipping through it seems to be less than half. Rest of them should have been charted also for those who like charts, the row-by-row word salad of knitting abbreviations lacks clarity.

I do have a few serious complaints about the book design that greatly hinders its usability:

- The layout guarantees that you have to be flipping back and forth, because the color photos of the projects are in the front, before all the patterns. There are NO photos or project illustrations in the pattern section of the book (not counting the charts in some of the patterns). The first book in this series, 101 One-Skein Wonders, did have small photos of the projects on the first page of the projects, so you could see what the text was talking about. Why didn't they do it this time? This is simply annoying and show lack of consideration for the reader.

- Lots of useful information is hard to find. For example, in the color photo section of the projects, they could have given the type of yarn used and the designer. Also, it would be nice if there was a single page or two that listed yarns used for each project and yardage (ordered by weight), so that I can find projects suitable for a particular yarn that I happen to have available. Yarn brands are not in the index either, so I have to page through the patterns to find if there is a pattern that uses a particular kind of yarn.

- They have a good section telling about the designers at the back, but in it they don't say which patterns each designer did. You have to go to the index for that.

- It continues in the absolutely awful trend of printing text with muted shades of ink, which greatly diminishes the readability of the text. In this case, grayish blue and sage green are used.

- The inner two inches of each page (closest to the binding) consists only of a decorative green rectangle. Often in book design, this is where sidebar content would go, or in the first 101 One-Skein Wonders, this is where the photographs of the projects went. In this book that portion of each page is almost completely unused, and it is visually ugly to have the left page and right page interrupted by this wide contentless rectangular blot. They could have saved the paper and ink and shipping resources and made the book smaller. Or better yet, they could have actually put some content there, like project photos, charts, and diagrams, or a sidebar telling interesting things about the yarn being used, etc.

The unfriendly aspects of the design of this book compete with the joy of the set of patterns, hence 4 stars instead of 5. Maybe the publisher can do better in future editions? It is still very much worth getting, and would be a great resource for knitted gift projects.

As a part-time knitter (Work, & other obligations in life take up the bulk of my time. *sigh*) I am a big fan of the "one skein" series. For those of us with little time or on the move, these small projects are great for their portability and that they can be done up quickly for immediate gratification or spur-of-the-moment gift-giving.

This is the third book in Judith Durant's series and many might be disappointed in that the projects might be considered "recycled" or not innovative enough to be considered new. This is a legitimate concern and for those knitters out there who have pretty much seen it, and done it all this book will not offer you anything new.

However, the main focus of this third installment in the series is to focus on the use of luxury yarns. This includes Bamboo, Alpaca, Silk, Soy, Quivit, etc. Yarns that due to their texture will not knit up the way wool and synthetics do. In fact some of these yarns can be problematic in their use in which case this book is really beneficial for providing small projects and the appropriate direction & advice for their creation.

If you are like me and not familiar with the use of these yarns, but would very much like to experiment, then this book will be very useful and you might actually be grateful that the patterns are so familiar.

I bought this book as a present for my mother for our extensive and fun collection of exotic yarns. We are both hand spinners so love projects that cater to our love of exotic fibers. I was so hopeful when I saw so many wonderful lacy patterns.

That is until I started knitting. EVERY SINGLE PATTERN we have tried has had numerous errors in the charts. This makes me wonder, does the editor even know how to knit? Without an option of reading the hand-written pattern we have had to either abandon our projects or muddle through, correcting the errors as we go. This has been very frustrating.

I gave the book a 2 star rating only because it wasn't actually over-priced for the amount of patterns. With over 100 patterns I hope to eventually find one that is correct.

All the glowing reviews - but most reviewers have not tried the patterns - which are filled with mistakes. I'd like my money back!

I bought this book for one particular pattern, the Joel Bison Lace Scarf, and the pattern make NO SENSE, either in the written words or the chart - there are symbols that are unaccounted for and the stitches don't add up. I can't find an errata for the book and no one on Ravelry seems to be working on this project.

I am an avid knitter and i have a voluminous number of knitting books. This is one of the worst! i give it one extra star because the patterns and yarns are nice. However, the errata is copious. Almost every pattern has an error. There are corrections on the publishers web site, but not to everything. There are still errors that the publisher has not corrected. Also, the binding quickly falls apart. I paid to have it spiral bound at Staples after it fell apart. Unless you really like the patterns, want to pay to have it rebound, and can figure out errors on your own, don't bother.

This book has beautiful patterns and I have made a couple of projects but... over 30 patterns have errors in them. You have to go to the publishers website to download corrections. This is really irritating since many are charts and to print off all will take quite some time. To spend money on the book and spend time and money to print the corrections is just frustrating.

There are too many errors in these books. I will never buy them again. Purchase at your own risk.

This is the third in the "one skein wonder" series, featuring 101 projects made of luxury yarns. As with all books in this series the finished projects are shown in full-color photographs in a gallery in the front of the book. The chapters that follow are divided by yarn weight. This format allows for two options of skimming: you can browse through all projects with a certain weight yarn that you may want to work with, or you can skim through the photographs to find a project that catches your eye as the starting point.

The yarns featured in this book are: silk and silk blends, cashmere, alpaca and alpaca blends, soy, qiviut (arctic musk ox), bison, and corn. Some `ecofriendly fibers' are featured: bamboo, flax, linen, organic cotton and organic wool.

Since luxury yarns are expensive, it is a great idea to have access to projects that can be made with just one skein. It is apparent that the designers tried to get the most and best use from each yarn, giving luxury yarns a project that would show off their unique beauty, or take advantage of the softest fibers to use it in ways that we can appreciate the sensual nature against our skin, such as a very soft scarf or a hat for a baby or an adult. The super fine weight yarns have been made into lovely lacey objects.

It seems to me that most of the projects are for the intermediate or advanced knitter. I feel this is due to the types of complex stitching used to either make a lovely lacey shawl or scarf or perhaps to make the one skein stretch to the largest size thing possible, as with the case with some of the scarves made more for show than warmth, and with an airy baby cap. There are gloves, socks, vests and baby sweaters which are projects or stitches for knitters with more skill than a beginner has.

While at first I was a bit disappointed there were not more easy projects for beginners, after reading through the book a few times I came to realize that this is probably due to wanting to use an expensive and luxurious yarn in the most appropriate way to `honor it', if you will, by matching its cost and level of luxuriousness to a finished project that will really show it off. One would not want to waste an expensive and fancy yarn on a basic garter stitch scarf or a simple ribbed hat, typical beginner knitting projects. Also some of the yarns are delicate and would not hold up to some of the easier to knit projects that might get hard wear and be ruined in a short amount of time.

I love the book because the designers have provided a variety of projects ranging from wearable items for babies to adults to home decor that make good and an appropriate use of the expensive luxury yarns. I am a beginner knitter and feel I'm not yet ready to knit most of these projects. I am inspired by this book to continue learning new knitting techniques and to try knitting with more delicate yarns. This book let me see that I have a lot of options for types of yarn to work with in the future.

As a beginner knitter for one-skein projects I can, for now, use the two other books in this series as I continue to learn. I have skimmed through those two books and highly recommend them too.

Knitters who love to fill their shelves with books that inspire them would like to own this book. Knitters who like to do small projects or who are looking for good projects to make gifts would like this. This is also a good book for a public library to have in their collection.