“Fifteen years ago I wrote this book with the intention of demolishing some of the myths surrounding Aran knitting. The publication of this new Dover edition is a natural point at which to look back over the years to assess how well I succeeded.” Alice Starmore, Aran Knitting New and Expanded Edition
Reading through the preface, which I assure you is for once a preface worth reading, I find the root of my fear of writing about Alice Starmore, and I now think I was building it up in my mind. Hopefully. Please don’t come after me. Alice!
She’s one of the most technical writers regarding knitting that I know of, and the depth of her technical knowledge and research is obvious after reading only a few paragraphs to start. And also why she’s so protective of her patterns, and how they are reproduced. “In 1993 my book Fisherman’s Sweaters was published. Among the many pattern motifs I created for it was a heart for a design called Nova Scotia, and a sculpted, cabled anchor for a design I called Mystic (…) Hearts and anchors are common motifs so I wanted to inject them with some originality. The results I produced were unusual, individual — and highly personal, but it did not prevent them from being lifted stitch for stitch from Fisherman’s Sweaters and used in an other book called The Great American Afghan (…) The Great American Afghan purports to be a showcase of Aran patterning, yet there in the book — and featured on its front cover — are three examples of my published work that have no connection with Aran whatsoever.”
The first section of this book dives deeply into the history of Aran knitting and the Aran isles, She then moves into more of the myths regarding Aran knitting, such as the pervasive rumor that the different patterns and cables in a sweater allowed the wearer to be identified if they drowned at sea and washed ashore. To Alice, it’s easy to tell that there is a “Blarney Factor” to be considered every time you hear of that particular tale.
Speaking of patterns and cables, the rest of the book is filled to the brim with plenty. Chapter two reads like a step-by-step guide to knitting cables, starting with simple right and left crossing rope cables, and goes all the way down to textured cable outline and lace-and-cable combinations.
After that master class, she goes in the patterns themselves. Now, the patterns are when I run into a bit of trouble, mainly because my own knitting gauge is very loose, and hers is very tight. For instance, for her Aranmor, she uses size 8 needles and a worsted weight wool and gets a gauge of 19.5 stitches to four inches, a feat I’m very sure I couldn’t manage, unless I went down to size 1 or 2 needles, and wanted to chop off my own hands by the end of the gauge swatch because they seized up so bad. That’s a personal problem, though. On the one hand, a tightly knitted sweater is great at keeping warm, but the fabric itself is difficult for me to replicate. However, I haven’t tried since college, so I think it’s due another shot.