Book Review: Vogue Knitting The Ultimate Quick Reference

September 7, 2020 by Sarah White

There are a lot of great knitting reference books out there but a lot of them aren’t very portable. Vogue Knitting aimed for a comprehensive guide to knitting that you can still stick in your knitting bag and take with you on the go with their Vogue Knitting: The Ultimate Quick Reference.

The book crams a lot into 184 pages, including:

Basic techniques, such as holding yarn and needles, casting on, knitting, purling, increases, decreases, binding off, cables, stranded knitting, intarsia, stripes, mosaic, lace and correcting mistakes.
Advanced techniques like entrelac, modular knitting, center-out shapes, brioche and double knitting.
Understanding instructions including gauge, schematics, counting rows, abbreviations and symbols
Correcting errors like twisted, dropped and incomplete stitches, lifelines, mending and darning.
Finishing, which includes blocking, grafting, picking up stitches, hemming, cleaning and storage of knits.
Embellishments like embroidery, beads and sequins
Tables and Tools such as needle and hook sizes, conversions and yarn weights.

Even the back flap of the book is useful, as it includes a stitch gauge and needle gauge you can take with you anywhere you take your knitting.

Techniques include written descriptions, how-to drawings and photographs of finished swatches. The pictures are a little small but not so small that they aren’t useful, and small illustrations help them include more information in a smaller space.

This book covers just about everything you might need to know when you’re away from a computer or a more thorough knitting reference book. If you find yourself often wishing you had a handy guide to remembering how to do Kitchener stitch or the right way to pick up stitches or you just want to learn on the go this is a great guide to have.

Flip through the book with me on Instagram.

About the book: 184 pages, paperback with flaps. Published October 2019, Sixth & Spring Books. Suggested retail $22.95.

Have you read?

Classic Dishcloth Knitting Patterns

Fall will be here before we know it, and that means there are holidays coming right behind where we might be entertaining at home. It’s always fun to have a hand knit touch in your home for other people to see, and if you’re going to be in the kitchen all day you might as well have some nice knit dish cloths to use.

I love this little plaid hand towel from Darling Jadore. Use a little bit of leftover cotton yarn from another project for the plaid portion. It looks like the horizontal stripes are worked as you knit and the vertical stripes are done with duplicate stitch, making this a quick and easy project even newer knitters can make.

Combine garter stitch and an easy eyelet pattern worked sideways to make the Annette Dish Towel from Cluck Cluck Boots, which is meant to be reminiscent of flour sack towels. It calls for DK weight yarn and you can work it in one color or two (or even three!).

Add a little more texture with this set of kitchen towels from Whileberry Creative. They’re mostly worked in garter stitch with borders in easy knit/purl patterns, and you can work them in sport or worsted weight yarn.

Two of Wands Shop has another cute allover knit and purl pattern they call the Seersucker Textured Tea Towel. It’s an easy repeating pattern worked in worsted weight yarn, and there’s a chart in the pattern you can use, but don’t have to, if you want to practice knitting from a chart.

The Classic Cloth dish towel from Handmade Home by Connie is another one that can use a little leftover yarn in a contrasting color, or you could color block it our use stripes throughout the pattern. This one uses worsted weight yarn and another easy repeating knit purl stitch pattern.

If you like to hang your towel on the oven handle or elsewhere but it’s always falling off, try the Stay Put kitchen towel from Fancy Step Knits. This project is worked in garter stitch and includes a hole partway through so you can pull the towel through itself over a rod or handle. Stripes are optional but a nice addition.