Customer Reviews

Shetland Lace

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

An interesting book on Shetland Lace, it consists of writen instructions rather than charts and the author has her own "stitch key" rather than the more familier knitting symbols in current use. That said, there are some lovely shawls and stoles with interesting, non traditional construction methods. It was intended to make Shetland Lace more accessible to knitters and tries to limit the amount of grafting involved in finishing. The patterns range from quite simple to a more advanced knitter. A nice addition to a "lace" library.

In response to the comments posted earlier, this book is a 2008 reprint of a book first published in 1993. Of course it doesn't use standard symbols because knitting symbols weren't yet standardized, and no one used charts either. I bought this book, as many people do, for the historically popular designs - the Gibbie has long been on my list to make. I'll probably make my own chart first though.

Given the title, I thought it would be a more definitive work on Shetland lace. It is not. It does have some nice patterns, one christening gown, two stoles, three square shawls, special occasion baby sweater and bonnet, one half-circle shawl, one circle shawl, one skirt and cape, and 13 stitch patterns. Two of the square shawls are very nice.

The greatest disadvantage to this book is it's use of unusual abbreviations. For example, one chart reads: (k1, T T T (c K1) 5 times, c T T T) 24 times. Yes, they used the same parenthesis for both sets of instructions rather than [ ( ) ] type instructions. You have to memorize or translate every instruction into standard instructions, and even there, a "c" means "cast up" or "wool forward" which I would have to assume is another way to say "yarn over". It is not clear. In fact, I found it so frustrating that I'm going to give the book to the local library for their next book sale.

I would recommend Heirloom Knitting if you're really interested in Shetland lace as a much better alternative.