Friday, April 27, 2012

"Can Ikea show you how to make your own dinosaur?"

If you don't think Ikea is taking over the world, or at least popular culture, I offer you proof. The science geek in me loves this, but I guess you could say I'm just a little biased. The second link is to photos of my studio, which is furnished almost exclusively with Ikea stuff, in case you haven't seen it.

At any rate, I think they're on to something with their minimal word instruction sheets. If you've put together a piece of Ikea furniture with your spouse, you can cross 'hand-to-hand-combat with a rabid ninja pirate' off your bucket list. All kidding aside, it beats the heck out of reading some badly edited techno-speak manual. A picture really is worth a thousand words.

So why haven't we embraced the Japanese style of knitting and crochet patterns? Here's a photo of a cardigan pattern I got from one of Donna Druchuna's Japanese Knitting classes:



This is the entire pattern. One page. So simple, so elegant. So much less to read, and the decisions about things like how to decrease for the shoulders can be based on your own skills and not the designer's. 

What do you think? Could you learn to embrace something like this? I realize Ikea isn't a Japanese company, but I think you get the picture. PUN INTENDED.

Have a great weekend!



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4 comments:

  1. have I told you lately how much I missed you? You make me laugh! I'm done with that damn pay it forward!!!! I am sending something to YOU and only YOU!!! So there.
    xoxox

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  2. The Japanese patterns are beautiful. I took Donna's class a couple of years ago and will take it again when she come to Olds Fibre Week in Alberta. There are so many Japanese designs that are on my to-do list.

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  3. My inflammatory opinion is that a large number of American knitters prefer patterns that spoon feed them.
    It strikes me that non-American knitters are much more willing to just jump in a go. "Oh, yes, of course I know how to do that logical step, you don't need to explain it to me."
    Does it say something about our critical thinking skills here in the USA? Or is it that more people have come to knitting later in life here so have less knowledge/practice?

    PS-Technically I think there are three types: 1)Spoon feed me; 2)Give me a pattern I can change; 3)Pattern? We don't need no stinking pattern!

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  4. I've never been to IKEA, I think I'm missing something big here lol.

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Let it all hang out. I usually respond, but if you're in the witness protection program and your email address is a secret, maybe check back here to see if I left a snappy comeback.

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