I met Gwen Bortner at TNNA a few years ago – we were both at the Yarn Thing Designer Dinner. She had recently published Entrée to Entrelac, and was kind enough to give me a copy. I haven’t knit a lot of entrelac, although I have tried it, and have been intrigued by the construction technique. However, I’m sure you know how these things are…. I got distracted by lace. And perhaps some double-knitting, cables and colour work. Anyhow, I’ve always been meaning to get back to it.
Earlier this winter, I was asked if I would write a review of the book, and I thought it would be a wonderful idea.
The early part of the book contains a very thorough explanation of how to work basic entrelac. It breaks it out into the most basic components (2 types of rectangles and 8 variations of triangles) and then launches into an explanation of how to create those. Like a lot of knitting, there aren’t really a lot of complicated stitches involved in creating entrelac – basically it’s knits, purls, some picked up stitches and increases and decreases. It’s the combination of these basic stitches that makes it interesting.
Gwen has a number of projects in the book that illustrate various points and types of entrelac knitting. But it was when we got to the combination chapters that things got really interesting. Most of the time when we see entrelac, it’s either stockinette or garter stitch. But there is no reason entrelac cannot be combined with cables or lace. Or why not all three at the same time?
I’ve been meaning to design an entrelac lace shawl for years. It’s still in the early stages of the design, but every so often I mull it over and refine my initial idea. This is an afghan, but it shows how effective it can be to combine entrelac with other types of knitting.
Another combination that really is right up my alley is with doubleknitting. Entrelac usually has a very pronounced right side vs wrong side, but with doubleknitting you end up with two “right” sides.
Really, I think that by combining various techniques, you can create items that are truly unique and wonderful And Gwen definitely manages to convey the love of entrelac and the joy of exploring new challenges in the book. She gives enough information to learn the techniques, and then describes ways to broaden the horizons from there.
Gwen blogs on regularly at Two sides – Two points together with Kellie Nuss. They recently published a review of my Shaping Shawls. If you’d like to read it, it can be found here.
