Knitting Ganseys

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: Knitting Ganseys is a clearly written book covering the history, technique and method of knitting gansey sweaters. This is more than a collection of patterns - Beth Brown-Reinsel explains the whys of each step & sweater section as well as the traditional alternatives. Her photos and charts are clear, and each chart has a legend - one doesn't need to flip back to the first chart to find an explanation of an obscure symbol. I would recommend this as a first sweater book, provided one already knows how to knit & purl in the round.

Rating:
Summary: An excellent reference
Review: Knitting Ganseys is a clearly written book covering the history, technique and method of knitting gansey sweaters. This is more than a collection of patterns - Beth Brown-Reinsel explains the whys of each step & sweater section as well as the traditional alternatives. Her photos and charts are clear, and each chart has a legend - one doesn't need to flip back to the first chart to find an explanation of an obscure symbol. I would recommend this as a first sweater book, provided one already knows how to knit & purl in the round.

Rating:
Summary: Tantalizing Gansey's
Review: This book has become a cherished reference and resource in my library of knitting books. Author Beth Brown-Reinsel accomplishes several tasks very well in this thoughtfully pieced more than a how-to-do presentation. She gives the reader a historical background in which to place the stiches, the craft of gansey; she provides wonderful graphs for the decorative stitches; she writes with an ease and enthusiasim that truly shows the reader how to learn new techniques... these are often backed up with clear photos. But, what she has done best has created a small knitting project that progresses side by side each chapter. This project teaches the knitter the different stages of a gansey sweater. The project is small enough not to be overwhelming for the beginner and complete in all the techniques that must be mastered in order to move to larger projects. As a middle-aged, "lay" knitter I am delighted to have discovered this book.

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: While I did find the history of Ganseys informative, the instructions for executing the techniques to construct the sampler--the instructional tool for practicing the techniques to be used in the construction of a full-size sweater--were not consistently clear.

Maybe the author assumed that her readers have a certain level of knitting experience and therefore left out instructions figuring that they would be able to fill in the blanks. It has been my experience, however, that the more care taken to explain something in detail, the more likely one will be understood, regardless of how experienced the reader is in the given topic. Because of this lack of detail in instruction, I got needlessly frustrated during each phase of the construction of the sampler. Also, I found the photographs less than helpful--they were taken too far away from the work to get a good look at the detail of the work in progress.

I've been knitting since 7th grade (I'm now 34) and have knitted sweaters successfully using Jacqueline Fee's "The Sweater Workshop", so I feel I have enough experience to consider myself beyond the brand new knitter stage. I gave "Knitting Ganseys" a try because I wanted to broaden my repertoire of sweater construction techniques. Through trial and error, I have learned a few useful techniques from "Knitting Ganseys" in spite of the author.

Before you consider buying this book, ask yourself if you want to spend time reading the author's mind or learning to knit sweaters. If you want to do both, then by all means, pick this book up. If you want to learn to knit a sweater without cursing at the author's inability to explain herself clearly, I highly recommend Jacqueline Fee's "The Sweater Workshop".

Rating:
Summary: Wealth of detail for knitting ganseys
Review: Work through the sample sweater in this book and you will be able to design your own gansey-style sweater to fit, no matter what size you (or your yarn) may be. Along with the techniques presented in the sample teddy-bear sized sweater, multiple options are presented for design variations, including armhole shaping, ribbing, and two complete alphabets.

The fitting method is based on measurements and gauge, similar to several "percentage" methods. The approach followed in this book is less mathematical than most, more common-sense.

There are six patterns in the back, with detailed instructions. Personally, I would have preferred more pictures, more different examples, without the detailed directions. The techiques presented in the sample sweater do not produce a "traditional" written pattern, and I found that the row by row instructions of these six examples were somewhat confusing.