Let’s Critique a Knitting Pattern.

 

This month, I once again made a pattern from a book I owned. The book, Knitting Socks with Handpainted Yarn is one I purchased myself but had not knit any patterns from it. There are 21 patterns by 18 different designers.

The sock pattern I chose had a 4-stitch repeat and came in two sizes;- 52 stitches and 60 stitches. No problem there, the pattern repeat is worked 13 or 15 times each round depending on size. But when it came to the heel divide, all the pattern says is “worked back and forth over 26 (30) stitches”. Remaining stitches (26/30) will be worked later for instep. But that number of stitches is not divisible by four and if the pattern directions were followed exactly, the stitch pattern would not be centered on the foot. Would anyone have noticed? Probably not. But still a simple fix; just need to move one stitch so that the pattern stitches on the instep are centered and have a border stitch at each end which I purled. Was this an editing or a pattern writing problem?

The other issue I found was at the end of the sock. After completing the heel, the start of the round is in the middle of the sole of the foot. After completing the toe increases the pattern says “use the Kitchener st to graft sts tog.” Except someone has forgotten that after working all the decreases you are in the middle of the foot so you have to work to the edge of the sock to be able to join those last stitches. Not a big deal for an experienced sock knitter – I do it without even thinking what the pattern says  - but if you are new to sock knitting you might think that you have to graft half the stitches and then rejoin the yarn to graft the remaining half.

As I said, I do not know if these were omitted by the pattern writer or removed in editing; either way they are small things which make a big difference to the satisfactory and successful completion of a sock.