Review: Color Knitting with Confidence

A lot of knitters are intimidated by color knitting, whether because they’re afraid of the techniques or because they don’t want to pick colors they end up not liking together. Nguyen Le tries to take some of the fear and mystery out of colorwork techniques with her book Color Knitting with Confidence (Barron’s, 144 pages, 30 patterns, October 2014, $19.99).

In the interest of full disclosure, my new book coming out in April is a colorwork book, so I might be a little more judgmental than others on this topic right now.

That said, this is a cute book that really focuses on people who are new to colorwork (and, indeed, new to knitting, as there are basic knitting instructions here, too). It covers knitting stripes, slip stitches, stranded colorwork, intarsia and double knitting with a focus on simple, often repeating designs and small projects.

Each chapter takes you through the basics of how to perform the given technique as well as offering some sample patterns you might want to play with. There’s a handful of patterns for each technique, most of which are pretty simple, such as an ombre striped baby blanket worked mostly in Stockinette Stitch, a slip stitch chevron rug, a collar worked with hearts in intarsia, fingerless mitts with stranded knit triangles (both of those are on the cover) and a double-knit belt that’s solid colors on both sides.

There are some more elaborate patterns as well, such as a baby cardigan worked in stranded knitting that involves cutting a steek, but most of these patterns are pretty straightforward, which is great for people new to colorwork but those with a few projects under their belts might find these options a little boring. (But they’re not the target audience anyway.)

That said there are some projects here that are really cute. I actually like those stranded mitts on the cover, and the color wheel pillow is super cute and I wish I’d thought of it. There’s a little bunny (that looks more like a mouse to me) with a stranded knit body that’s really sweet, and the double-sided double-knit cowl is pretty and practical.

So if you’ve been afraid to try color knitting in the past (and don’t want to wait for my book) and are looking for some straightforward patterns to get you started, this is a good book to check out.

Have you read it? Or are you in the fear of colorwork boat? I’d love to hear about it!