Customer Reviews

Tatting Butterflies (Dover Needlework)

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I feel the same way about this book as I do about the Tatting Hearts book - i wasn't oohing and aahing about the designs, and it was more like a lesson in split rings, and the designs were an excuse to use them. I didn't like ONE butterfly design in this book, and a lot of them didn't look like butterflies.

I was really surprised because I had heard great things about these books, and i was hoping to find some cute hearts and butterflies to tat. Try to look at a copy first before you buy!

For such a small, inexpensive book, TATTING BUTTERFLIES includes a lot of information about tatting styles and techinques. The Reverse Riego style, directional joins, reverse double knots, lark's heads, split rings, directional tatting, stacking, three beading techniques, and the Dora Young knot are explained. The five motif designs and their variations provide opportunities to practice these techniques, and there are not only "butterflies", but four chain edging designs. I was thoroughly impressed with the way the art of tatting is advanced through this book.

The only weaknesses are the line drawings, some of which are "jagged", as if a bitmap graphics program were used instead of a vector application to render smoothly curving lines. And on a purely subjective note, the stylized butterflies look more like elaborate corners for handerkerchief edgings. I haven't figured out why the word "butt" is used to indicate the part of an insect known as an abdomen, but the author is probably not an entomologist. The "Tatbit" (an anthropoid figure) on the cover "being carried off by butterflies to a tatting paradise" is rather odd.

All in all, however, this is an intriguing book to add to your tatting collection for the various techniques that it explains.