For Knitting Experts

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 15 June 1935, Page 12

For Knitting Experts

Matter of Arithmetic The geometry which can be performed with knitting does not cease its variety, and knitting has become a staple article of dress, almost as has a man’s soft hat or flannel trousers. Libraries of knitting books are frequented by those who knit, and if knitting bees and knitting instruction shops have not been started in this country it is not for .want of knitting devotees. One tiling knitters do not emphasise enough, and that is a feel for knitting. With diligence and sufficient quiet, for doing sums almost anyone can knit almost anything from a book. The marvellous cable and other stitches which are seen are not miraculous ; they are a matter of arithmetic. But a. feel for knitting docs not count slavishly without much idea, of what is going to happen from such counting. The real knitter knows about stitches to the inch and to the needle; knows beforehand the amount icf decreasing and increasing which will produce a certain effect. Just as in cutting out there arc certain standing proportions which the good cutter knows, so- in knitting there are certain lengths and breadths; certain castings off and castings on which make or mar the jumper. After knitting a jumper or two the good knitter should begin to realise these effects; to feel that front or yoke or sleeve is like reaching a. certain chapter in a story, i and that certain measures will be necessary to lead one to a. conclusion. Just as a tailor, instead of taking stuff in can shrink it smaller, so the knitter can perform miracles with larger or with small needles, knowing exactly the effect of No. 7 or No. 8 as a painter knows colour. Thus the real knitter models rather than counts; measures rather than murmurs, “Slip one, cast on two” ; eyes j the subject rather than fits to her a recipe designed for all. j