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A Stash of One’s Own – Clara Parkes

A Stash of One’s Own – Clara Parkes

I like to read essays on knitting – I own several collections and am always keen to read more.

This is a series of designers and knitters (all the usual suspects) writing about what stash means to them.  Some are sad, some are funny and they are all easy to read. And if you have a particular stance on stash someone in this book will be on your side.

Here is the blurb …

This addictive-to-read anthology celebrates yarn—specifically, the knitter’s reputation for acquiring it in large quantities and storing it away in what’s lovingly referred to as a “stash.” Consider contributions from knitting and teaching luminaries, including:
BUST co-founder Debbie Stoller
Meg Swansen, daughter of master knitter Elizabeth Zimmermann
Knitting blogger and author Susan B. Anderson
alongside offerings from knitting greats Amy Herzog, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, and Franklin Habit—plus, stories from a romance novelist, an illustrator, a PhD-wielding feminist publisher, a globetrotting textile artist, a licensed clinical social worker, and the people behind the world’s largest collective online stash, Ravelry.com. The pieces range from comical to earnest, lighthearted to deeply philosophical as each seeks to answer the question of how the stash a knitter has accumulated over the years reflects his or her place in universe.
The stories in A Stash of One’s Own represent and provide validation for knitters’ wildly varying perspectives on yarn, from holding zero stash, to stash-busting, to stockpiling masses of it—and even including it in estate plans. These tales are for all fiber artists, spinners, dyers, crafters, crocheters, sheep farmers, shop owners, beginning knitters to yarn experts, and everyone who has ever loved a skein too hard to let it go.

If you are a knitter (or you need to buy a gift for a knitter), then this a great book.

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Threading Time – A Cultural History of Threadwork – Dolores Bausum

Threading Time – Dolores Bausum

I can’t remember where I first heard of this – I think it was on Amazon in the people who bought this also bought that section. It combines two of my loves – threadwork and literature. Here is the blurb …

In a ground-breaking survey taken primarily from literary sources, Threading Time reveals the essential link between the human spirit and the art of connecting threads. Whether looking at stories about clothing made in the Garden of Eden, a medieval manuscript, or modern fiction and poetry, the author traces the importance to humankind of a craft that has never ceased since it began at least forty thousand years ago. The author’s conception of threadwork throughout is generic, including all kinds of work done with thread, yarn, or fiber.

In the author’s long-range view, threadwork becomes more than a garment, a rug, or a tapestry on the wall. It is often a bond shared with contemporaries and with ancestors, a link between humans and cultural beliefs, even a tie between humankind and the Divine. This age-old association of interwoven fibers and humanity is found today in a metaphor that is used to convey the concept of shared traditions, values, and beliefs: the fabric of society. A rip in the fabric can be alarming; mending it is necessary to avert instability and even chaos.

Threading Time opens with stories from biblical traditions that continue to influence society. Next come portrayals of threadworkers in Greek and Roman myths and those suggested on the famous marble frieze carved on the Parthenon of Athens. The author then turns to Piers Plowman, Chartres Cathedral’s windows, the Bayeux Tapestry, and other textile evidence from the medieval era; she suggests how threadwork in those centuries became identified with spiritual faith and belief in miracles.

An illustrated French manuscript and the Apocalypse Tapestry highlight a discussion of changes in the lives of cloth workers that occurred during the Renaissance. Works by two Germans—playwright Gerhart Hauptmann and artist Käthe Kollwitz—illustrate labor struggles that persisted for centuries in textile production. Selections of poetry by English poets such as Robert Burns and William Blake provide glimpses of protests made by some against economic forces disrupting the lives of textile workers during the Industrial Revolution.

Novels by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edith Wharton, and D. H. Lawrence suggest that threadwork activity itself may arouse, release, or inhibit strong feelings, even erotic passion, between men and women. These novels also demonstrate that needlework and its products can be used to stigmatize, ostracize, or control an individual. Both fictional and real-life accounts follow in a discussion of works by three nineteenth-century writers—Charles Dickens, Louisa May Alcott, and Mary Boykin Chesnut—who illustrate the power of threadwork during wartime to transform solitary individuals into patriots and lift the morale of civilians who share common beliefs and objectives.

Novels by Edith Gaskell, Edith Wharton, and Theodore Dreiser, as well as several memoirs, offer examples of textile work that individuals have done in peacetime when their daily survival hung by a thread. Finally, the author turns to twentieth-century American authors Margaret Mitchell, Alice Walker, Anna Quindlen, and John Updike for glimpses into families whose members are linked by threadwork. As an original view of threadwork written from a broad chronological perspective, Threading Time will appeal to textile artisans and collectors. It will also interest lay readers of literature, women’s history, and cultural history.

This book is lovely – academic, but not overly so, beautiful illustrations and suggestions for further reading. Many of the novels mentioned I have read (I am now keen to read One True Thing), which made Ms Bausum’s analysis even more interesting.

There are nine chapters

  • A Time to Sew
  • Athena’s Gift
  • Threads ‘Twixt Cloister and Crown’
  • Art of the Loom
  • Ballads of  Harp Weavers
  • With Passion and Thread
  • Battle Yarns
  • Sewing for Bread in Years Gone By
  • Fortunate Daughters and Sons

Each chapter looks at a different period of time and refers to literary texts of the period: the bible, works by Homer, etc. She also references the Bayeux tapestry and the Apocalypse tapestry.

If you are at all interested in textiles, women’s history or literature then I think you will find this book fascinating. In fact, this is the book I would have liked to have written.

 

 

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The Subversive Stitch – Rozsika Parker

The Subversive Stitch – Rozsika Parker

This is a fabulous book – not for the faint-hearted as it is quite scholarly, but for anyone interested in history, feminism embroidery and social history it is a must read.

Here is the blurb …

Rozsika Parker’s now classic  re-evaluation of the reciprocal relationship between women and  embroidery has brought stitchery out from the private world of female domesticity into the fine arts, created a major breakthrough in art history and criticism, and fostered the emergence of today’s dynamic and expanding crafts movements.

The Subversive Stitch is now available again with a new Introduction that brings the book up to date with exploration of the stitched art of Louise Bourgeois and Tracey Emin, as well as the work of new young female and male embroiderers.  Rozsika Parker uses household accounts, women’s magazines, letters, novels and the works of art themselves to trace through history how the separation of the craft of embroidery from the fine arts came to be a major force in the marginalisation of women’s work. Beautifully illustrated, her book also discusses the contradictory nature of women’s experience of embroidery: how it has inculcated female subservience while providing an immensely pleasurable source of creativity, forging links between women.

Rozsika Parker, sadly she died in 2010, was an art historian, feminist and pyschotherapist who wrote about women, art and women’s place in the art world.

This is how Parker described this book

By mapping the relationships between the history of embroidery and changing notions of what constituted feminine behaviour from the middle ages to the 20th century, we can see how the art became implicated in the creation of femininity across classes and that the development of ideals and feminine behaviour determined the style and iconography of needlework.

The book is divided into eight chapters

The Creation of Femininity

Eternalising the Feminine

Fertility, Chasity and Power

The Domestication of Embroidery

The Inculcation of Femininity

From Milkmaids to Mothers

Femininity as Feeling

A Naturally Revolutionary Art?

This book is essentially about how needlework and femininity became synonymous and then how needlework was used to train and constrain women. However, it is also about how some women used embroidery in subversive ways to make a statement or to pass on a secret message. They took back something that was meant to be oppressive and made it their own (a bit like the recent pussyhat movement).

I wrote down so many quotes while I was reading this book that I could be here for days typing them out – I think it would be much better if you just read the book yourself. Take your time – there is a lot in it. I read it in 30 minute bursts.

I do have two small complaints – I wish the images were in colour (but that would make the whole thing too expensive) and I wish it was in chronological order rather than thematic.

More reviews …

http://significantseams.org.uk/book-review-the-subversive-stitch-embroidery-and-the-making-of-the-feminine-by-rozsika-parker/

>The Subversive Stitch by Rozsika Parker

 

 

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Mason Dixon Knitting – Kay Gardiner and Ann Shayne

Mason Dixon Knitting

Mason Dixon Knitting – Kay Gardiner and Ann Shayne

I found this while in Singapore (at Kinokuniya – well worth a visit if you’re ever in Singapore). I have been reading their blog for ages, but never came across the book in Australia.

I loved this book it was witty and light-hearted and had several projects I would like to try. It is a great mix of projects and knitting observation/lifestyle.

I am super keen on a log cabin blanket …

Log Cabin Blanket

Log Cabin Blanket

I am also quite keen to try the wash clothes – although I find it quite hard to find cotton yarn.

Mason_Dixon_02

Here are some of the things that made me laugh out loud

As it turns out, however, a sweater doesn’t look exactly the same on a fortysomething mother of two as it does on the leggy twenty-year-old model who is wearing the sweater (and, often, only the sweater) while cavorting on the moody, misty moors of Yorkshire.My beloved Rowenta [an iron] is right up there with my engagement ring and photo albums on the list of things I would try to grab and take with me if the house was burning down.

The television natters on,politely, as British detectives solve another of the violent murders that are such a plague upon the quaint rural towns of England

And now just a nice quote about knitting

[…] you begin to think that knitting for another human being is the best way to express love, concern and solidarity.

 

 

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Knitlandia – Clara Parkes

Knitlandia - Clara Parkes

Knitlandia – Clara Parkes

I do like a book of essays about knitting – things like Sweater Quest and Yarn and Yarn Whisperer (also by Clara Parkes), so I was super-keen to read this one.

Here is the blurb …

Knitting aficionado and notable artisan Clara Parkes delves into her storied travels with this inspiring and witty memoir on a creative life enriched by her adventures around the world.

Building on the success of The Yarn Whisperer, Parkes’s rich personal essays invite readers and devoted crafters on excursions to be savored, from a guide who quickly comes to feel like a trusted confidante. In Knitlandia, she takes readers along on 17 of her most memorable journeys across the globe over the last 15 years, with stories spanning from the fjords of Iceland to a cozy yarn shop in Paris’s 13th arrondissement.

Also known for her PBS television appearances and hugely popular line of small-batch handcrafted yarns, Parkes weaves her personal blend of wisdom and humor into this eloquently down-to-earth guide that is part personal travel narrative and part cultural history, touching the heart of what it means to live creatively. Join Parkes as she ventures to locales both foreign and familiar in chapters like:

Chasing a Legend in Taos
Glass, Grass, and the Power of Place: Tacoma, Washington
A Thing for Socks and a Very Big Plan: Portland, Oregon
Autumn on the Hudson: The New York Sheep & Wool Festival
Cashmere Dreams and British Breeds: A Last-Minute Visit to Edinburgh, Scotland

Fans of travel writing, as well as knitters, crocheters, designers, and fiber artists alike, will enjoy the masterful narrative in these intimate tales from a life well crafted. Whether you’ve committed to exploring your own wanderlust or are an armchair traveler curled up in your coziest slippers, Knitlandia is sure to inspire laughter, tears, and maybe some travel plans of your own.

This gave me an insight into ‘knitting tourism’ or all of the knitting festivals that now take place. It was definitely interesting, but I think I prefer more emotional or personal life stories – plus all of the places she visits are so far away from me that I am unlikely to ever visit them (not that that is a fault in the book).

Another review …

https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/knitlandia-a-knitter-sees-the-world-review/2016/02/08/2b163de0-ce63-11e5-88cd-753e80cd29ad_story.html

 

 

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Slow Stitch – Mindful and Contemplative Textile Art – Claire Wellesley-Smith

slow_stitch_cover

This book was a christmas present – I was quite keen to read it, so I dropped a few hints.

Slow_02

It is split into four sections; Slow, Materials and Techniques, Cross-Cultural Activity and Contemplative.

First, this is a beautiful book. The images are spectacular and the cover is fluffy! There are a lot of amazing ideas about mindful stitching practice – I particularly like the section on walking and community activities.

I am quite keen to try thread dying and the daily walking practice (where you observe the seasonal changes).

Dying threads - I find this  appealing and something that I could actually do

Dying threads – I find this appealing and something that I could actually do

This is part of her daily walk - how beautiful is it?

This is part of her daily walk – how beautiful is it?

My only concern (as usual) is what to do with the finished pieces? The pieces in the book are beautiful, but do you frame them? Make a quilt out of them?

Although this is a book about slow stitching, it is really about a slow and sustainable life. Getting in touch with nature (through gardening and walking), sustainability (using things you already have) and community involvement. I’m a sucker for anything pretty and I certainly don’t ‘make do’. I have piles of yarn, embroidery threads, fabric and books, but I would like to live a slower and more meditative life.

More reviews …

http://www.textileartist.org/book-review-slow-stitch-2015-by-claire-wellesley-smith/

http://englishgirlathome.com/2015/10/16/slow-stitch-a-book-review/

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Book Review – Sweater Quest by

Sweater Quest -

Sweater Quest – Adrienne Martini

I read about this book while trying to find craft memoirs of lifestyle books, but read A Life in Stitches instead (the negative reviews on Amazon put me off). However, about a week ago I came across a comment in a blog recommending it and I thought why not give it a go. I’m glad I did I really enjoy it. I thought the interviews with other knitters fascinating (that was one of the complaints on Amazon). Here is the blurb …

“I knit so I don’t kill people” —bumper sticker spotted at Rhinebeck Sheep and Wool Festival
For Adrienne Martini, and countless others, knitting is the linchpin of sanity. As a working mother of two, Martini wanted a challenge that would make her feel in charge. So she decided to make the Holy Grail of sweaters—her own Mary Tudor, whose mind-numbingly gorgeous pattern is so complicated to knit that its mere mention can hush a roomful of experienced knitters. Created by reclusive designer Alice Starmore, the Mary Tudor can be found only in a rare, out-of-print book of Fair Isle–style patterns, Tudor Roses, and requires a discontinued, irreplaceable yarn. The sweater, Martini explains, “is a knitter’s Mount Everest, our curse, and our compulsion. I want one more than I can begin to tell you.”
And so she took on the challenge: one year, two needles, and countless knits and purls to conquer Mary Tudor while also taking care of her two kids, two cats, two jobs, and (thankfully) one husband—without unraveling in the process. Along the way, Adrienne investigates the tangled origins of the coveted pattern, inquires into the nature of artistic creation, and details her quest to buy supplies on the knitting black market. As she tries not to pull out her hair along with rows gone wrong, Martini gets guidance from some knitterati, who offer invaluable inspiration as she conquers her fear of Fair Isle. A wooly Julie and Julia, this epic yarn celebrates the profound joys of creating—and aspiring to—remarkable achievements.

I’m quite curious (nosy) and I like detail about other people’s lives – how they go about things, what they like etc. Although I had heard of Alice Starmore (and the controversy), I had never seen any of designs (might be something to do with living in Australia). Her patterns are spectacularly beautiful, but I don’t know if the finished product would suit many people. I enjoyed reading about each of the challenges in this project – learning to hold a ball of wool in the non-dominant hand (I don’t think I could master that), finding the wool (that elusive last colour) and then the endurance to get the thing finished. I didn’t really understand her preoccupation with whether it was a real Starmore or not. She didn’t use the recommended yarn (which was no longer available), so can she truly say she has knitted Mary Tudor – personally I think if you have done the knitting then you have made the Starmore – of course it is easier now because both the yarn and the pattern have been re-released.

Ms Martini has a lovely, chatting writing style and I enjoyed many of her personal ancedotes – I’ve tried to teach my girls how to knit! I would have loved pictures (but maybe there are copyright issues?)

I found this to be a quick, interesting and enjoyable read (I even thought about buying one of Alice Starmore’s kits except I’m trying to reduce my stash), but I think it will only appeal to knitters.

More reviews …

http://champagneandsocks.com/2012/05/06/book-review-sweater-quest/

http://thedomesticsoundscape.com/wordpress/?p=1833

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A Life in Stitches – Rachael Herron

A Life in Stitches

A Life in Stitches – Rachael Herron

I like what I am going to call craft memoirs – like this one or this one – I read about A Life in Stitches somewhere (ravelry maybe) and ordered it from the book depository.

Here is the description …

In these 20 heartfelt essays, Rachael Herron celebrated romance novelist by day, 911 dispatcher by night, and founder of the hugely popular blog Yarnagogo.com shows how when life unravels there’s always a way to knit it back together again, many times into something even better. Honest, funny, and full of warmth, Herron’s tales, each inspired by something she knit or something knit for her, will speak to anyone who has ever picked up a pair of needles. From her very first sweater (a hilarious disaster, to say the least) to the yellow afghan that caused a breakup (and, ultimately, a breakthrough), every piece has a moving story behind it. This beautifully crafted and candid collection is perfect for the knitter who loves to read and the reader who loves to knit.

This is a very personal account of knitting and various different life events – some sad and some funny. I found it entertaining, fascinating, thought provoking and occasionally sad. I’m quite nosy I like to know details about people’s lives – not in a malicious way I’m just interested in how people live. Accordingly, I found this glimpse into Ms Herron’s life compelling.

Another review …

http://knitting.about.com/od/knittingmemoir/fr/A-Life-In-Stitches.htm

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Yarn: Remembering the Way Home – Kyoko Mori

Yarn: Remembering the Way Home

Yarn: Remembering the Way Home -Kyoko Mori

I don’t know how I came across this book. I was looking for something like Knitting Philosophy or Knitting Lifestyle. Possibly it came up as a suggestion from Amazon based on other books I have read.

Here is the blurb …

A memoir of crossing cultures, losing love, and finding home by a New York Times notable author. As steadily and quietly as her marriage falls apart, so Kyoko Mori’s understanding of knitting deepens. From flawed school mittens to beautiful unmatched patterns of cardigans, hats and shawls, Kyoko draws the connection between knitting and the new life she tried to establish in the U.S. Interspersed with the story of knitting throughout, the narrative contemplates the nature of love, loss, and what holds a marriage together.

This book is a memoir about one woman coming to terms with her mother’s suicide, her father’s indifference, a new country (and culture), marriage and dissolving a marriage. And it’s about knitting. Often Ms Mori uses knitting as a metaphor to describe some relationship in her life. For example,

While I had been working to expand my social circle, he had been trying to make his smaller. If my ideal life was a big Fair Isle sweater his was a white linen handkerchief.

She is a solitary person who spends a lot of time thinking (and knitting). It is a quiet story that unfolds slowly, but brutally honest. When her father died without a word to her – she finally realised …

A part of me wanted to believe that Michiko [her step mother] had kept us from having at least one honest conversation. Okiyo-san’s story put an end to this sorry delusion. My father had plenty of time to say his last word to the people he cared about. I wasn’t one of them.

Her writing is beautiful – simple and elegant. This book is for anyone not just knitters, but knitters will especially enjoy it. There is even a section at the end about knitting books.

Another review …

http://www.theitofknit.com/recent-posts/book-review-yarn-remembering-the-way-home-by-kyoko-mori.html

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Up Down, All-Around Stitch Dictionary – Wendy Bernard

Up Down All-Around Stitch Dictionary - Wendy Bernard

Up Down All-Around Stitch Dictionary – Wendy Bernard

I ran my second half-marathon at the end of August (this one) and I decided I needed a bit of a reward. Hence this book! I had eyed it off a few times, but thought do I really need another stitch dictionary? But what is great about this one is the fact that there are instructions for each stitch pattern in the round, flat (from the bottom up) and flat (from the top down)!

Given that I mostly knit socks from the top down (and obviously in the round) this is brilliant!

It is split into eight sections:

  • Knits and Purls
  • Ribs
  • Textured, Slipped and Fancy
  • Yarnovers and Eyelets
  • Cables
  • Lace
  • Colourwork (I had to put the ‘u’ in colour)
  • Hems and Edgings

Each section also has a project – items like socks, mittens, lace stole, a jumper. I’m quite keen on the Checkerboard Mesh Pullover.

Checkerboard Mesh Pullover

Checkerboard Mesh Pullover

and the lace stole

Lace Stole

Lace Stole

As you can see from the above images, it is published in binder form, which means the book lies flat on any given page – I am not sure that was necessary it just means it takes up more space on my book shelf!

I think this is a great resource. Definitely worth buying if you like to design your own knits or even alter an existing pattern (there are instructions on how to switch stitch patterns) or maybe convert a flat pattern into the round, or knit something from the top down instead of up – the possibilities are endless.

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