Customer Reviews

Vogue Knitting Stitchionary Volume One: Knit & Purl: The Ultimate Stitch Dictionary from the Editors of Vogue Knitting Magazine (Vogue Knitting Stitchionary Series)

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

First of all, I will admit that I am a sucker for knitting and crochet dictionaries. I have all of the classics from the Harmony guides, Barbara Walker's treasuries to the older Mon Tricot books. There have been several other dictionaries, and I have also purchased them rationalizing that if I miss a pattern in one book, I may give it more attention in another one.

I was excited when I heard Vogue knitting was going to publish a series of dictionaries based on all of their magazines; I am not only a subscriber but have kept all of the back issues. I pre-ordered the book from Amazon, and awaited its arrival with anticipation.

As a dictionary, it does stand on its own and if you use knitting dictionaries, it is good to have it in your collection.

But wait a minute.

This is supposed to be Vogue Knitting who publishes a first rate knitting magazine as well as many books based on their magazine patterns. Moreover, their knitting on the go series was innovative. When a publication aspires to promote knitting and high standards, this dictionary is a disappointment, and I saw it in minutes after I read through it for the first time. The editors missed an opportunity to make this book stand above the other dictionaries for the following reasons:

No charts! Any stitch dictionaries published today should now have charts! Even Barbara Walker saw this in her early classics and did them for her cable work. The newer dictionaries chart their patterns and there is no excuse to exclude them in this kind of book.

Color choice and yarn weights. If this book is to be considered a classic, the faddish use of this color was a bad choice. Fads come and go, especially greens, and I don't understand what they were thinking when they used this color. Personally, I love the color green, however I found that the color was inappropriate for showing some of the stitches. The brightness of the yellow-green was a problem for showing textured stitch contrast and the darker greens were poor choices for showing floral style patterns. They also used the same yarn weight throughout the book; this was a serious problem in the lace section of the dictionary. They should have either used a lighter weight yarn or gone to a larger needle. Both the color and yarn weight compromised the beauty of lace stitches. Any knitter who submits swatches for the Knitter's Guild Master's Programs would have their swatch work rejected if they did something like this.


References! If these patterns are based on previous sweaters published in the magazine as the editors claim, why not reference the original pattern? This alone would have distinguished this dictionary from the others. I hope the editors will take this to heart and publish an erratum to this book.

Where were the editors when this book was being assembled? Was there a critical review of this book before it went to print? I would not discourage anyone from purchasing this book, but I will think twice before I purchase the second one in the series. It is good as another stand-alone dictionary but it does not live up to its title. I am convinced that the other higher end magazines publishes such as Interweave Knits and Knitter's Magazine would never publish a dictionary with these kinds of flaws. The editors of Vogue Knitting should know better and could have done better. I hope they will rectify these obvious mistakes in their future dictionaries.

This book has so many great looking stitch patterns. I wonder about the choice of the dull green yarn for some of the chapters, as it completely distracts from the beautiful stiches. I've tried out a few patterns already and.. maybe it's just me, but a few of them seem to have problems. I'll await other reviews to see if anyone else has had this problem with some of the patterns. It seems that the issues are with the intial stitch counts for some of the lace patterns. I've worked them, reworked them, frogged them, and tried again, but some aren't adding up. If I chart out the stitches, I can see that in some cases, the pattern has me working in multiples of five stitches, when the initial instructions ask for multiples of four.

If you are serious about knitting--like I am--and want to know if this book is for you, ask yourself the following question: Do I write my own patterns or will I in the future? If so, then this guide is indespensible. It contains all the knitting stitches featured in Vogue knitting since it's creation some twenty years ago which in reality is really what is what you want from a stack of old Vogue Knitting magazines anyway! The styles certainly fade and change, but the stitches will always come in handy and here they are--in one neat, tidy package. It's a gift to a knitter--corrections needed here and there nonwithstanding--to have a consice guide of a large vareity of stitches and as a fledgling designer, I was estatic to discover it. It has several sections: Knit and purl, lace, traveling, and unusual.

That being said, I can't say I wouldn't recommend this guide to someone who doesn't design their own patterns. Eventually, we knitters all like to do our own thing with an established pattern, such as substituting a more interesting stitch where a pattern calls for stockinette. Or when we would like to whip up a scarf in something other than the usual k1p1, k2p2 or garter stitch. So when it comes to branching out in your knitting and putting a more personal touch on established patterns, buying this book is the equivilent of dipping your toes in the water before you jump in. Either way, it's a good buy.

So my recommendation is this: if you're a designer or a patternless wonder, then buy it ASAP--it is a bargain for what you get, which is the real reason I give five stars to anything--it was well worth the money. If you are a bit timid and never meddle with an established pattern but are beginning to feel a bit constrained, then I highly recommend that you take a gander in person at a friend's house, local bookstore or yarn store before purchasing it sight unseen. (Needless to say, buy it on Amazon--it goes a long way to filling up that $25!)

As for the book's layout and the choice of green, the green doesn't bother me (although I think beige would have helped), but there is *loads* of room in this book--indeed, like the other reviewers have noted: where are the charts??? Even a few little ones would be a help to those readers who prefer charts to paragraphs, of which I am one. But all in all, this is a minor flaw, as you can work from the paragraph, although it being Vogue, I can't help but puzzle over the ommission. Vogue books usually have all the bells and whistles.

To see my future commentary and patterns using this book, check out my blog in the future at knitterhead.blogspot.com. I am working on a man's zip-up cartigan and will be using the book for the basic stitch patterns.

Stitch dictionaries are useful to inspire original knitting patterns, as well as to check the accuracy of printed knitting directions. So I was excited to find Volume 1 of Vogue's 3-volume Knitting Stitchionary series. However, I must say that I am quite disappointed in this book. Having grown used to almost all knitting instructions (however simple) being accompanied by a chart to quickly show the knitter the pattern, I found the lack of charts in this book to hamper its usefulness. Also, I found the lack of an index to be seriously annoying. For example, I wanted to refer to directions for the "Harris Tweed" stitch, and I ended up having to thumb through 40 pages of the book, only to discover that this quite common and beautiful pattern is not included!

The book does include 265 stitches made using only the knit and purl stitch,including a fairly extensive collection of lace patterns.

If your knitting library has room for only one stitch dictionary, I think there are better ones available. For the money, I recommend "The Big Book of Knitting Stitch Patterns" which is much more user friendly and available in paperback.

The blurb for this book states that it includes charts, but my copy has only written instructions. What happened to the charts? I'd be more inclined to use this book if I could SEE how the stitch patterns are formed. I'll also think twice about buying Volume 2 (cables) when it comes out in May if it only has written instructions.

What a disappointment. Vogue Knitting was a pioneer of charts for knitting patterns way back in the 80's. I expected better.

Okay, I'm a knitting book junkie, so of course I have Barbara Walker's collections of stitches, which certainly have more material and are easily as accurate as this book, but the Vogue series is comprehensive enough and so beautifully arranged by type of stitch and pattern to make me reach first for one of them. This first one, appropriate for beginners who want to expand their craft, is so clearly and beautifully photographed that the pictures themselves give a tremendous amount of information (which in itself trumps the Barbara Walker books, photographed in slightly fuzzy black and white) for design or even swatching for pleasure -- ask a maniacal knitter about that one if you need to. Anyway, it takes a lot for me to break down and buy yet another knitting book (or three or more, in this case), but this series is a must-have for me and probably for most knitting teachers and designers. At least have a look at it for yourself.

This book has a wide variety of stitches, but is far from being a complete stitch library. It is a good reference and introduction to simple knit and purl patterns, laces, etc. The pictures show the pattern very clearly, and it is nice to be able to compare one stitch to another using the same yarn. It would be nice, however, if the authors had included some more editorial comments about the stitches (which stitches work well with which yarn weights, etc.) There is no information about that whatsoever. The book simply shows a swatch and gives the written directions. I have found it very useful and inspiring in creating my own patterns/pieces.

This is the first time I've *ever* written a book review, but I had to this time! I was pretty excited to get this book, but like the other person who wrote a review, I was less than pleased with the green yarn selected, although it does photograph well. I have not had any problems knitting the patterns as of yet, although I have only knitted two or three so far.

I love the layout, and how the patterns are arranged from easy to hard. And I really like the Unusual Pattern section. All in all, it's a great book, but probably not worth the $30-something that Vogue Knitting is charging if you order through them. But definitely worth the $19 through Amazon! :)

I love these types of books as I am always looking for different patterns to use as I design nearly all the sweaters that I knit. This is a wonderful collecton.

Here is what I really like - you can see the entire swatch so you can see the differences in cast-on edges and cast-off edges. The organization is nice. There are some unique patterns.

Here is what I really don't like - why isn't there an index or a table of contents so you can find a pattern you like again. The color coding is somewhat helpful but it is frustrating.

I also don't understand why charts weren't included as there is plenty of space. It would be helpful as there are some errors in some of the lace patterns and a chart would be a good double check.

I agree with the other reviewers - what is with the green? In some cases the stitch pattern is not really shown off by the yarn.

I found this book very useful because it has more than 200 stitches--which means I don't have to look at different books and magazines to find the perfect stitch style for my designs. I create women's and babies' apparel. Personally, I love green, so I loved the pictures, the color scheme made the book look clean and neat. I have tried three of the stitches and plan to use a lot more. No problems. However, this book is for those who are more into designing a project and creating unique pieces. It gives you the freedom to choose the stitches you want for your creations. The book may not be too useful for beginners who need to follow a given pattern, but for advanced knitters this book should be a lot of fun.