Book Review: Outlander Knitting

I haven’t read the Outlander series or watched the show, but I know there is a lot of knitting shown in the series that has caused a lot of knitters to pay attention and try to re-create some of the looks from the show.

Outlander Knitting, edited by Kate Atherley, is the official book of knitting patterns from the series and include 20 designs that are inspired by looks, characters or designs from the show.

There are warm, woolly shawls, textured socks, mitts and more to keep you warm in the Scottish highlands and across the stretch of time.

The book includes photos from the series as well as information on how the costumes were designed, Fair Isle knitting and just how accurate a mildly gross scene in the show involving traditional fiber arts techniques really is.

Some of my favorites include the Garter Stitch Rent Shawl, designed by Nicky Jensen (she actually knits it on the bias using intarsia for the stripes to make it a little more interesting to knit, though there is also a basic top-down version); Claire Neicho’s Targe Tam, a stranded colorwork design inspired by shields shown in the show; The Man I Left Behind Vest, Kathleen Sperling’s ode to the classic Fair Isle vest; and Holli Yeah’s I Found Him Lace Cardgian, with a big allover diamond lace pattern.

You can check out all the patterns on Ravelry.

This is a fun book for Outlander fans, and others who enjoy rustic and classic knits. A few times I wish there were more or different pictures so you could get a better look at some of the projects, but on the whole this is a lovely book where you can find your next project for knitting while binge watching.

About the book: 192 pages, hardcover, 20 patterns. Published by Clarkson Potter, 2020, suggested retail price $24.99.

When I was looking around for free knitting patterns to share recently, I came across this fun leopard print wrap from Yarnspirations.

This fun bulky wrap gives you tons of practice with instarsia and makes a bold statement while keeping you warm. It’s rated for intermediate knitters and the design is charted but pretty easy to follow. And it’s only 50 rows and worked in bulky yarn, so it wouldn’t even take that long to knit. (You can grab the free pattern from Yarnspirations.)

So what’s the problem? The yarn that the pattern calls for has been discontinued, and it’s not a yarn that a substitute for immediately springs to mind.

The original yarn was Patons Alpaca Blend, a single ply bulky yarn that was a combination of acrylic, superwash wool, nylon and alpaca.

My first thought was Lion Brand Hue + Me, which is an acrylic and wool blend, with two plies instead of a single. It looks like it has the colors you would need to make this fun shawl.

But as I was thinking about it, I thought this would be a good opportunity to introduce you to YarnSub if you don’t already know about it. This website is a giant database of yarn that can consider the qualities of the yarn you want to substitute and offer potential substitutions.

It’s not only thinking about yarn weight, like I was, but also fiber content, number of plies, gauge and even the difference in yardage between one ball and another. It even looks at the price and can be filtered by your price range or preferences about fiber content (if, say, you’re sensitive or allergic to wool, for example, or don’t want to you acrylic).

When I plugged in Alpaca Blend, it gave me a lot of different options, though many of them were self-striping or multicolored, which wouldn’t work for this project, and I don’t see a way to filter for solid colors only.

Still, it’s a good tool to give you some ideas you might not know about or might have forgotten about, and it tells you how the new yarn is similar to the old one and how it differs, allowing you to make smarter choices when substituting yarns.

[Photo: Yarnspirations]

Have you read?