This complete guide will take you from your first brioche stitches to your first (or hundredth) project, and even to designing with brioche stitch, if you desire. Whether you're new to brioche knitting or experienced at "brioching," author Nancy Marchant provides the information and inspiration you need.Inside "Knitting Brioche," you'll find: Detailed instructions and step-by-step photos that will guide you through all of the techniques you'll need for brioche knitting.A stitch dictionary including 60 beautiful stitch patterns with many multicolor options.25 patterns for garments and accessories, all made with brioche stitches, some combined with other design elements including cables, lace, intarsia and more Grab your needles and yarn and take a bite out of brioche knitting.

    The groundbreaking style-guide from bestseller author Charla Krupp on how to look 10 pounds lighter, 10 years younger and 10 times sexier every day, all year--in summer, winter, at the gym, even in a swimsuit!You'll never get dressed the same way again once you discover:Smart, easy ways to hide arm flap, a big bust, a muffin top, back fat, Buddha belly, a big booty, wide hips, thunder thighs, and heavy calves-and that's only half the book.Which fabrics, colors, and styles make women look fatAbsolutely the best shades, shapes, and brilliant buys to make the pounds invisibleClever solutions for special fashion situations--workout gear, evening wear, and even swimsuits!Which products, fashions, and services you shouldn't waste your money onThe top ten tips that will make you look thinner by tonight! So, if you've ever put on a piece of clothing and asked "Does this make me look fat?" Finally, here is the book that will answer your question.

    Imagine a pattern. A pattern for a simple skirt. Let’s call it “The Skirt.” Now, imagine that this pattern is magic—it not only yields one stylish skirt, but in fact can be used to make six stylish skirts. By following different markers on the pattern, “The Skirt” can be: 1) an A-line skirt; 2) a maxi skirt; 3) a flirty pleated hem skirt; 4) a smart-looking pencil-wrap skirt; 5) a flared bias skirt; 6) a ruffled mini. But wait, there’s more! Following each look are six fabric recommendations, some of them easily repurposed. So now, not only does each pattern turn into six patterns, but each of the six patterns can turn into six different garments. With six magic patterns in the book, the end result is 216 original designs! The skill level is basic, and there’s a complete sewing primer included, with recommendations for basic tools, step-by-step instruction, a guide to fabrics, and a sizing reference chart.Includes 36 downloadable patterns on a CD.Express your fashion sense, look great, be creative—and save money. Now that’s magic.

    The pleasures to be had from slowing down can be many, with connections to sustainability, simplicity, reflection, and tuning into traditional and other multicultural textile traditions.Slow Stitch is a much-needed guide to adopting a less-is-more approach, valuing quality over quantity, and bringing a meaningful and thoughtful approach to textile practice.Claire Wellesley-Smith introduces a range of ways in which you can slow your textile work down, including:Using simple techniques inspired by traditional practice (including hand-stitch rhythms)Reusing and re-inventing materials (reuse even old textile projects)Limiting your equipmentMending revisited (practical and decorative techniques)Project ideas and resources that help towards making a more sustainable textile practiceRichly illustrated throughout, and showcasing work from the best textile artists who work in this way, this is a truly inspirational book for those looking to reconnect with their craft and to find a new way of working.

    Walker in her renowned tome Knitting from the Top. But never have the results looked as glamorous and city-chic as they do in Modern Top-Down Knitting. In this sophisticated wom­enswear collection, designer Kristina McGowan presents streamlined, feminine dresses, tunics, and skirts; elegant cardigans and pullovers; and stylish go-to accessories such as hats and mitts. Also included are step-by-step photo tutorials that make top-down techniques easy to understand and sizing and style adjustments a cinch to achieve. Detailed instructions are also included for finishing garments with couture-quality trims and linings, so they look just as elegant on the inside as they do on the outside.
"Kristina McGowan presents a charming collection of original designs in knitwear, to inspire knitters of all levels of skill. Her work incorporates the two essential qualities of good knitting direction: (1) her ideas are fresh, fashionable, and interesting; and (2) her instructions are clear and easily followed. Hers is an excellent book." Barbara G. Walker

    Hollywood stars have always furthered fashion’s cause of seducing the masses into buying designers’ clothes, acting as living billboards. Now, forced by the explosion of social media and the accelerating worship of fame, red carpet celebrities are no longer content to just advertise and are putting their names on labels that reflect the image they—or their stylists—created. Jessica Simpson, Jennifer Lopez, Sarah Jessica Parker, Sean Combs, and a host of pop, sports, and reality-show stars of the moment are leveraging the power of their celebrity to become the face of their own fashion brands, embracing lucrative contracts that keep their images on our screens and their hands on the wheel of a multi-billion dollar industry. And a few celebrities—like the Olsen Twins and Victoria Beckham—have gone all the way and reinvented themselves as bonafide designers. Not all celebrities succeed, but in an ever more crowded and clamorous marketplace, it’s increasingly unlikely that any fashion brand will succeed without celebrity involvement—even if designers, like Michael Kors, have to become celebrities themselves. Agins charts this strange new terrain with wit and insight and an insider’s access to the fascinating struggles of the bold-type names and their jealousies, insecurities, and triumphs. Everyone from industry insiders to fans of Project Runway and America's Next Top Model will want to read Agins’s take on the glitter and stardust transforming the fashion industry, and where it is likely to take us next.

    Written by an industry insider, the Guide takes a comprehensive, unflinching look behind the scenes that no knit or crochet designer can afford to be without. Includes 30+ interviews with top designers, editors and professionals who tell it like it is so you can hit the ground running, a guide to responsible social media use, information on distribution, printing, online publishing and much, much more.

    To describe them all would be to describe the entire history of sewing. In "The Art of manipulating Fabric," Colette Wolff has set herself just this task, and she succeeds brilliantly. Working from the simplest possible form - a flat piece of cloth and a threaded needle - she categorizes all major dimensional techniques, show how they are related, and give examples of variations both traditional and modern. The result is an encyclopedia of techniques that resurface, reshape, restructure and reconstruct fabric. More than 350 diagrams support the extensive how-tos, organized into broad general categories, then specific sub-techniques Handsome photos galleries showcase the breathtaking possibilities in each technique and aid visual understanding by emphasizing the sculptured fabric surface with light and shadow Textile artists and quilters, as well as garment and home decor sewers, will expand their design horizons with the almost limitless effects that can be achieved

    The section on people gives simple tricks for showing emotion (angry, surprised) and action (skipping, doing a handstand). There's also a section on clothing that shows how to draw coats and jackets, shoes and boots, bell-bottoms and skinny jeans. From tricycles to tanker trucks, the book gives tips on drawing all kinds of moving vehicles.At then end of each chapter, author and artist Chika Miyata challenges you to synthesize what you've learned and create a scene. At the end of the chapter on animals, the challenge is to draw a zoo. At the end of the chapter on food, the challenge is to keep an illustrated food journal.Each entry is broken down with step-by-step illustrations, making this book perfect for beginners or experienced artists in need of a quick refresher and a great resource for those who want to express themselves through illustration or cartooning. Each book in the Almost Everything series offers readers a fun, comprehensive, and charmingly illustrated visual directory of ideas to inspire skill building in their creative endeavors.

    Real people of all ages are featured in photographs that explain the steps of cutting out pattern pieces, pinning them together, and adjusting the fit. Special attention is paid to tricky challenges such as accommodating a full bustline, adjusting sleeves, or reworking a garment to make it more flattering, as well as alternative fitting methods such as draping and computer design. Metric conversion charts, charts for comparing pattern company bodice measurements, and a history of American dress design (Just where did size 10 come from?) make this book a versatile reference.

    Book by Walker, Barbara G.

    30 detailed and easy-to-follow patterns for garments and accessories are presented including a slimming Jackie Kennedy-style Camelot coat and a reversible tank top with scoop neck.

    Herein lies the beauty of Custom Knits, which teaches knitters how to use improvisational techniques to achieve spectacular results—and to unleash their inner designers. Wendy Bernard, creator of the popular blog Knit and Tonic, provides 25 original designs for sweaters of nearly every type, plus variations, most knitted in one piece starting at the top, a method that allows you to try on as you go, alter as desired, and essentially design on the fly. “Make It Your Own” prompts in each pattern suggest easy alterations to suit your style and body type. And an in-depth reference section teaches how to alter key sweater elements, for example, change a crewneck to a V-neck, add sleeves to a vest, and much more. For the truly adventurous, the book concludes with guidelines for knitting sweaters with no pattern at all. Bernard’s friendly writing style and photographer Kimball Hall’s lively images create an inviting book of beautiful designs and key techniques that a knitter can use to customize nearly every garment she knits from now on.

    The book will be visually arresting, exciting to read and an inspiring fashion bible. Charting the incidents and ideas that changed the way women dress, it gives a unique perspective on the history of twentieth-century fashion. Rather than just documenting the changes in fashion, it also explains why these changes happened. From the invention of the bias cut and the stiletto heel to designers such as Coco Chanel who changed the way we think about clothes, the book will be entertaining, intelligent and a visual feast.

    Designed to meet the needs of the basic sewer, Sewing for Plus Sizes guides the reader through such important steps as selecting designs, colors and fabrics that will enhance plus-size figures.