Tuesday, 6 October 2015
The Art of Crochet Magazine Review
It's no secret that I love craft magazines (that is, if you follow me on Instagram!) Mr Heart & Sew works from home and his job is very demanding. Sometimes when he's crazy busy working on something I'll head to the local shop and buy myself something crafty to read. It gives me some "me time" and there's nothing I love more than a crafty read, a glass of wine and a bubbly bath! So when The Art Of Crochet got in touch and offered me a free subscription in exchange for my honest thoughts I naturally said yes!
The Art of Crochet is a series aimed at beginners and those looking to learn how to crochet. Whilst I'm obviously not a beginner in crochet, I've never really made anything except amigurumi! I was excited to learn that the main project for the series is this wonderful throw:
With every issue you get the pattern and yarn needed for a new square. Every square uses a different technique and stitch from the last, so you will learn all the ins and outs of crochet as your throw grows in size. I admittedly don't know every stitch, so this will be a good learning experience for me too! Here are the first 3 blocks of my throw. The purple square is a back loop only square, the pink is front loop only and the green is plain old single crochet.
Now I'm not going to lie to you, the yarn that you get with the series isn't great. I'm 99% sure the yarn used for the beautiful throw in the pictures is not the yarn you are supplied with - which is a terrible shame! I wish they had used Stylecraft Special DK for the series, which is both lovely and affordable. I considered raiding my own personal stash for the throw but thought I should at least try a square with the supplied yarn. It actually doesn't look too bad once worked up so I will reluctantly continue using it for my own throw. On the bright side, the hook supplied with the series is actually pretty nice and I didn't feel the need to dig out my Clover Amour set to make the squares.
The series comes with a binder so you can separate the pages of each magazine (which are glued and come apart easily) into their relevant categories. This makes it easy to find projects and reference back to stitch instructions when you need to. The binder is divided up into 7 different categories: Projects for You, Projects to Gift, Projects to Try, Projects for the Home, Crochet School, Stitch Library and of course The Throw - where you can store the patterns for all your squares! One thing to be noted about craft magazines is that they are often either very expensive, or stuffed with mostly adverts and no substance. The Art of Crochet on the other hand, is neither expensive nor filled with adverts - there aren't any! You also get an abundance of wonderful free gifts with your first few issues:
So far I have the yarn bag and one of the hooks. I like the hook and the yarn bag really does come in handy! I have wanted a row counter for ages, so I can't wait for issue 5 when I receive mine!
♥
All in all I find the series to be very affordable, interesting and full of variety! I think it is exceptional value for money considering the amount of patterns you get (think of it this way - one online pattern download would set you back the cost for one whole issue) I am really excited to finish the beautiful throw and expand my crochet skills along the way!
Make sure to follow me on Instagram if you would like to keep up to date with the progress of my throw. If you're interested in purchasing your own subscription to The Art of Crochet you can do so here.
Happy hooking & happy reading!
Julie xxx
Disclaimer: The Art of Crochet provided me with a free subscription in order to review the series. All thoughts and opinions are honest and 100% my own. I was not compensated for this post.
With every issue you get the pattern and yarn needed for a new square. Every square uses a different technique and stitch from the last, so you will learn all the ins and outs of crochet as your throw grows in size. I admittedly don't know every stitch, so this will be a good learning experience for me too! Here are the first 3 blocks of my throw. The purple square is a back loop only square, the pink is front loop only and the green is plain old single crochet.
Now I'm not going to lie to you, the yarn that you get with the series isn't great. I'm 99% sure the yarn used for the beautiful throw in the pictures is not the yarn you are supplied with - which is a terrible shame! I wish they had used Stylecraft Special DK for the series, which is both lovely and affordable. I considered raiding my own personal stash for the throw but thought I should at least try a square with the supplied yarn. It actually doesn't look too bad once worked up so I will reluctantly continue using it for my own throw. On the bright side, the hook supplied with the series is actually pretty nice and I didn't feel the need to dig out my Clover Amour set to make the squares.
As well as the throw, the series is stuffed full of many other projects and patterns, ranging from cushions and bags, to amigurumi and neck ties! It's all projects no articles in this series, so if you read craft mags for the articles The Art Of Crochet isn't for you.
The series comes with a binder so you can separate the pages of each magazine (which are glued and come apart easily) into their relevant categories. This makes it easy to find projects and reference back to stitch instructions when you need to. The binder is divided up into 7 different categories: Projects for You, Projects to Gift, Projects to Try, Projects for the Home, Crochet School, Stitch Library and of course The Throw - where you can store the patterns for all your squares! One thing to be noted about craft magazines is that they are often either very expensive, or stuffed with mostly adverts and no substance. The Art of Crochet on the other hand, is neither expensive nor filled with adverts - there aren't any! You also get an abundance of wonderful free gifts with your first few issues:
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I'm a fairly advanced crochter. There is not a lot about crochet that I don't know, or haven't made. So while this wouldn't be something I would need to purchase, it definitely sounds like a great product for beginner crocheters. I only wonder how easy the instructions are to follow, if you are someone who has absolutely no skills or knowledge at all of crocheting. Personally I find that written instructions for crocheting (even for beginners) is often difficult to understand without prior knowledge.
ReplyDeleteI can chime in and say that I have subscribed and have been following along with this throw since October/ November and while at first I did find the instructions extremely tricky to follow along, after watching a few YouTube videos for each crochet stitch I can now say that the magazines are a lot easier and the squares actually get completed now. That said, I do have to redo them more times than I can count, but practise makes perfect right �� In my opinion, I don't believe these are for beginners, maybe for someone who has been through the basics, but definitely not for complete novices like I was. However, to comment about the yarn, while I don't know that much about yarn, I can say that from having to unravel my granny squares countless times, the yarn still remains strong and robust, and hasn't frayed or turned ratty in the slightest, so it's a thumbs up from me :)
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