Have you ever heard of “hen knitting”? It’s not knitting sweaters for chickens, but a colorful, DIY, make-it-up-as-you-go technique for knitting garments that originated in Denmark. (The story goes that Kirsten Hofstatter wrote a knitting book in the 1970s and tried to get it published by a publisher called Red Rooster. They rejected it so she started the Hen Press to publish it herself.)
The patterns in this style of knitting are colorful, with lots of different motifs that can be personalized and changed to suit your sweater or other garment. This is not a style for perfectionists. If it will drive you crazy that the giraffes at the center front of an otherwise adorable kid’s sweater don’t have heads because of the neck shaping, this is no the book for you (or just rearrange the motifs so something shorter goes at the top).
Knit Yourself In: Inventive Patterns to Tell Your Story in the Danish
“Hen Knitting” Tradition by Cecilie Kaurin and Linn Bryhn Jacobsen features more than 20 patterns, mostly for sweaters covered with colorful motifs such as flowers, fish, sea creatures, horses, farm animals, fall leaves and more.
The sweaters often have multiple sizes but the charts are pretty much the same for each size and don’t always end with a full repeat of a motif. This is apparently kind of the point, as one sock pattern’s notes explain:
By choice, we decided not to adjust the stitch counts for all the motifs to match up. That’s because the main concept of hen knitting is that the knitter should decide what motifs to use. It’s much easier to be creative if you don’t have to worry about aligning every panel or motif.
So, again, if I haven’t made it clear, this is not a book for perfectionists who want the pattern to tell them how to do everything. If you want all the motifs to work out on whatever size garment you are knitting, you can work it out yourself if need be.
There are some really cute projects in this book if you do like the anything goes style or are willing to make adjustments on the fly. The aforementioned giraffe sweater, called Animals in Africa, is one such project. It also features birds, crocodiles, elephants and fish and is super adorable.
I also like Happy Colors for Your Feet, a scrappy project featuring bands of tulips; Little Sailor, a pint-sized sweater with boats, anchors and fish; High Skies and Bright Colors, covered in bands of fall leaves; and the Inca scarf, which is not traditional hen knitting but shows how you might combine some of your favorite motifs with stripes in a project that’s great for stash-busting.
There are also tips for placing the name of a person on a sweater, working neck openings, sewing shoulder seams and working steeks, since all of the projects are worked in the round.
This is a really fun book for brave knitters who aren’t afraid of using lots of color and using patterns as guidelines rather than a set-in-stone view of how a project is going to go.
Have you ever done “hen knitting”? What do you think about it? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Book specifications: 140 pages, hardcover with spiral binding, 22 patterns. Trafalgar Square Books, published November 2015. Projects on Ravelry.
I’ve never done “hen knitting” before, but when looking at a graph, if there’s part of it missing, I suppose I’d have to color it in, to make sure that all of the animals have heads, and that everything is accounted for!! I’d hate to do all of that colorwork, and see that the pattern is mis-matched in some way!! Thank you for the great giveaway, nonetheless!! I’m still game!!
I have never done when knitting but I don’t mind the fact of there being a partial character in the piece. In seeing it is sometimes difficult match motifs or plaids.
Well if the book cover is anything to go by , I’d say that I would love this type of knitting. I love mixing and matching motifs with patterns so I probably I would switch the motif so I didnt head up with the headless giraffe