If you or someone you know is looking to learn to knit, Learn to Knit in 50 Squares: A 2-in-1 Knitting Course and Blanket Pattern by Anna Pantelous is a good place to start.
As the name suggests, it covers everything you need to know to knit, as well as purl, working patterned stitches, cables, colorwork, lace, brioche, mitered knitting and more. Each pattern is a square using one or two colors, and each square teaches a new technique.
If you work your way through the whole book you’ll have a full arsenal of knitting techniques, and plenty of squares to make a blanket.
Pantelous argues that squares are a better way to learn than the traditional scarf, because they’re small enough you can toss or unravel those first wobbly efforts, rather than having a project like a scarf where you can see the improvement happen as you knit. Small projects like squares are also likely to get finished pretty quickly, and they give new knitters a chance to pick up different skills quickly if they want.
The author is a right handed knitter who works in continental/picking style, sot he instructions emphasize that way of knitting. There are notes included for knitters who work English/throwing style, but they aren’t as detailed. Projects also include “geeky notes” with more information about the stitch or technique, as well as tips for success.
The very first square is plain garter stitch, of course, with drawings how to cast on (using long tail cast on, which is not my favorite for beginners), knit and bind off.
From there knitters explore slipping a stitch on the edge, working garter stitch in two colors, making a stockinette stitch square with garter stitch edges, seed stitch, a diamond worked in reverse stockinette on a field of stockinette and so on. After a few patterns she starts using abbreviations, and the diamond is charted to teach knitters how to read a simple chart.
From there they go on to things like mitered squares (which teaches decreasing), eyelets, twisted stitches, cables, knitting a flat shape in the round, jogless stripes, stranded colorwork, intarsia, mosaic, Latvian braids, illusion knitting, double knitting, bobbles, entrelac, brioche and more. Techniques are included like provisional cast on, three needle bind off, adding a pocket with mattress stitch, working duplicate stitch and so on.
It also includes tips for putting the blanket together and ideas for more techniques you might want to learn that are not in the book.
There are a lot of techniques in this book, which is fun even for knitters with a few projects under their belts. What annoys me most is all the projects have a name that goes “the xx one,” for example “the diagonal one” or “the neat one.” That tells you nothing about the techniques that are used in the project and the index doesn’t seem to include all the techniques so you can find the one you want without flipping through the book.
Still, there’s a lot of fun stuff here for new knitters or those who want to hone some new-to-them techniques.
About the book: 128 pages, paperback, 50 patterns. Published 2025 by David & Charles. Suggested retail price $24.99.
