Books
It’s Here! Field Guide No. 4: Log Cabin
Dear friends,
We are bursting with excitement to introduce the newest little book in our series: Modern Daily Knitting Field Guide No. 4: Log Cabin.
This time, it’s personal. Log cabin knitting has been a huge part of our lives. Before we learned this simple yet revolutionary technique, neither one of us would have dreamed of sitting down with a batch of colors of a yarn we love, casting on, and just knitting.
Log cabin never disappoints. In the many years that we’ve been knitting this way, log cabin always leads to something interesting and beautiful, for both the knitter and the lucky person who gets the finished piece.
Our kids have grown up dragging log cabin blankets around the house in the morning. Our sofas would look naked without short stacks of folded log cabin blankets, waiting for someone in need of a snuggle. We have knit log cabin rugs for the floor, and cushions for hard chairs. We have knit small log cabin blankets for babies, and even smaller ones for dogs and cats.
Log cabin is a technique that gives a knitter the ability to play with color and pattern, using only the most basic knitting skills. To get in on the fun, you just need to know these techniques:
Cast on.
Garter stitch.
Bind off.
Pick up stitches.
That’s it!
Log cabin is play. Log cabin is painting, but with yarn.
We thought a lot about how to teach log cabin knitting in the easiest, most beautiful way possible. This pocket-sized book is the result of that effort, and of the many years we’ve been knitting and loving this technique.
Here’s a peek at Field Guide No. 4: Log Cabin.
Project Number One
Log Cabin Cloths. These mini cabins are small, but mighty. Each one teaches a basic element of log cabin architecture. Make all six, and you will learn everything you need to know to knit almost any log cabin project, from the center patch to the edging. You’ll have six soft, pretty cloths to use as washcloths, dish rags, or the makings of a cushion or baby blanket.
The yarn: Rowan Handknit Cotton.
The Shop has two cheerful colorways.
Project Number Two
Ninepatch Blanket. We couldn’t do a log cabin book without including a quilt-inspired blanket—that’s how this adventure started. This project was inspired by a quilt we saw online that, at first glance, looked like a random patchwork, but in fact was an unconventional setting of the traditional ninepatch quilt block. Although each of the 14 blocks of the Ninepatch Blanket is constructed in exactly the same way (using skills learned making the Log Cabin Cloths), the blocks play with color placement and scale, so that no two are the same. You can place the colors exactly as shown in the pattern, or any way you like. That’s the fun of log cabin.
The yarn: Berroco Ultra Alpaca.
The Shop has kits in two colorways, warm and cool.
Project Number Three
Sommerfeld Shawl. When thinking about how we could show how far log cabin can go, we immediately thought of knitwear designer Ann Weaver. Much of Ann’s work takes inspiration from Josef Albers’s seminal color study paintings, and log cabin construction is one of her signatures. The Sommerfeld Shawl, directly inspired by stained-glass windows that Albers designed for a Bauhaus residence, takes log cabin to a transparent, glamorous and lacy place. It’s an intriguing puzzle to knit, and will fit into the most sophisticated wardrobe.
The yarn: Neighborhood Fiber Co. Loft.
We have four colorways of this stunning hand-dyed yarn.
We’ve been dreaming of this day for a while now, and we can’t wait to hunker down and knit log cabins with you all. Please take a look and join us. There’s big fun ahead.
Love,
Kay and Ann
YES! I log cabin. You taught me and I’ve never looked back.
So glad!
Log Cabin, hooray! I am ready for some new dishcloths, and they will be the perfect knitting for the wonderful quiet beach days coming up.
Ann Weaver, I love that wrap!
Log Cabin!!! Is my middle name! You taught me and I am making one as I type. Thank you
That warms my heart. Each one teach one!
I am currently making your blanket from Drop Dead Easy Knits. One square to go. The scarf from Ann Weaver is gorgeous. Off to order my book.
Get cracking on that last square now….I thought I was watching that pattern like a hawk on Rav but I missed yours. Must try harder!
Fun! I have never thought of trying it on my dishcloths as well. I have a Log Cabin Blanket in my UFO pile, from your book. As the temperatures have dropped here this week, and yesterday the Canada Geese were flying in Vs, it would be a good time to finish it up.
One nice thing about log cabin that we didn’t mention in the book is that when you leave a project marinating for a long time, you still remember how the pattern works when you pick it back up again. Geese flying! No! Too soon!
OMG!! I LOVE log cabin!!
I KNOW RIGHT? It’s still the one! Xo
Whoa! Beautifully said. An MDK tradition which is close to my heart and the hearts of countless knitters. This looks wonderful. I am overwhelmed with joy!
My Gield Guide #4 and Sommerfeld Shawl kit are already on order!
What color are you making? I can’t really decide. One minute I’m all: neutral. Then I think: blue is always good. Then . . . yellow . . . then pink . . . I may just need to go random.
For this time around, I’m doing the blues.
Wow Diane I hope you love it! Mine is sitting here waiting to be cast on.
I have had a long love affair with log cabin knitting, beginning with Valentina Devine right through AnnWeavers Albers Cowl (five squares make a scarf). On my needles now: Kay’s A Buncha Squares made with my vast stash of shetland yarn. Its an endless addiction!
Buncha Squares! What a blast from the past! I learned so much fooling with that blanket and it is still a favorite. Let me see yours when it’s done!
Maybe this will inspire me to pick up Moderne again!
Super tempting, so I might have to take the plunge! I knit Ann Weaver’s “Albers Cowl” twice, and would love to do it again, as it is perfect “meeting knitting” with gorgeous results. Perhaps instead I will knit the Sommerfeld Shawl – wow!
In the Albers Cowl, I worked my way around with each color in “log cabin” fashion, as I learned from your very first book, rather than starting and stopping to work each side of each color as the pattern is written. (The way I calculated it, there would be 26 ends for each of the 3 blocks in the pattern = way too many), whereas using your method of working around, only 8 ends / block). Here’s a link to my projects on Ravelry: http://www.ravelry.com/projects/tamarajo/albers-cowl
Love all of this! So fun and beautiful! Thank you!
I don’t think I knew about the Albers Cowl. Just looked it up on Pinterest. Save me! I’m about to fall down another rabbit hole!
Two years ago, I took a spinning class and ended up with some lovely colorful bits of yarn and log cabined (is that a verb?) them into a pillow (http://www.ravelry.com/projects/pennieb/how-to-log-cabin).
Last weekend, I was in a workshop on natural dyes and came home with 17 little skeins of beautiful colorful fiber – five cotton and four each hemp, silk and wool – that I didn’t know what to do with. Your timing is perfect! Log cabin! Of course!
Natural dyed yarn? Swoon. That’s going to be so gorgeous.
This is the Field Guide for which my heart has been longing. Ordered PB + Ravelry download!
I love your field guides! They’re perfect for my commute. My cloths kit is on the way and that’s going to keep me company on the train, too.
You guys are the world’s greatest enablers!
Oooh. I have to have this, in print as well as download. There is something so lovely about holding a knitting book in my hands. Looking forward to delivery!
I can’t wait to see what you cook up–I know it will be surprising and unique!
I’ve made a couple log cabin baby blankets (your “Moderne” I think?) and many washcloths – my little nieces love them. Ordered the book last night and look forward to hours of washcloth knitting in upcoming travels.
The ultimate portable knitting–bon voyage!
Thanks to yawl I love log cabim knitting. These these are really
beautiful innovative designs! Love them! (Perhap this will get me to to
Youtube how to graft the icord edging of the queen-size Moderne Log Cabin I made last summer. Yep, over a year and ends not grafted. Although the blanket has been used. Both not spending a moment to finish a project amd using it anyway seem to be my MO. Predicability is a good thing, right?
I haven’t ever done that grafting thing, either! We need to get Kay to show us.
Congrats on your newest baby! Can’t wait for the log cabin KAL talk to begin, and then to see the project pictures start showing up in a forum thread 🙂
Me too! It’s amazing how many ways log cabin can be worked.
My MDK Cotton Classic log cabin baby blanket has been in continual progress for about ten years now. It’s a blanket that’s also an activity, because I keep adding scraps of cotton classic, and it’s completely usable in between adding new stripes. It’s around twin sized now, who knows how big it will eventually become.
Well, that’s just amazing. I would love to see this! What a fantastic idea—Just. Keep. Going.
This is a project I would love to learn! After crocheting the same pattern for over ten years, I feel it’s time for a change in my routine. Thanks for the article! I can’t wait to get started!
Wonderful–you have a great new decade ahead of you. : )
Have bought the e-book, to add to my MDK field guide collection. Love it, made your Joseph’s Blankie of Many Colours from the first MDK book a few years back. It has been well loved and fought over by my kids ever since!
That’s so great to hear. Thank you so much, Sarah!
Thanks also for the intro to Chawne Kimber’s work and blog – she is a genius and her blog is just great, such fresh writing!
Ditto! Following her on Instagram, as well.
I got it and I love it!!! Almost finished with one of the cloths. Can’t wait to see everyone’s nine patch quilt. I started a fabric double nine patch quilt decades ago but never finished. Can’t wait to start a knitted one.
Thank you, Kay and Ann, for sharing your passion and creativity..
http://www.ravelry.com/projects/benedetta/mitered-crosses-blanket-for-mercy-corps
My venture into log cabin, courtesy of Kay’s beautiful pattern.
It was fun! even for a non aficionado of garter stitch like me!
but that shawl is really tempting…
Oh my. I just recently favorited the Albers Cowl, but now it might have to be a shawl.
My Log Cabin for Judah ( dang! I wish I knew how to link to ravelry! – I’m ‘lightdove ‘) was the funnest Log Cabin ever, inspired by MDK, in Noro brights. Very reminiscent of a small beautiful Kandinsky at MOMA. (She said, humbly!)
My Mitered Crosses is taking a breather – the colors I chose may have been too subtle to keep me engaged – but I’m thinking of an Albers- like TV cozy to hide the black hole of the screen in my new New York apartment.
Guess I’d better get the guide! You are such enablers! Love the nine patch, too. And while I’m singing your praises, the shawl that riffs on that unfinished Prada sweater is terrific, too.
MDK rules!
I had to take a look at your rav project age, and you sure do have some lovely work there! In terms of linking a project here, I think you start by clicking the “share this” button on your project page 🙂 Worth a try – that’s a stunning log cabin!
Oops. Losing my “p” key! I did not check the age of your project!
I made my first log cabin this summer – a blanket for the baby I’m incubating. I thought I’d better start early, so I’d finish by late October, but it flew off my needles. I love it!
Oh how sweet – that must be very happy knitting!
Still happily using our (triple-stranded) cotton, log cabin bathmat from the pattern in one of your books.
Log Cabin will forever be synonymous with Modern Daily Knitting in my mind!!! 🙂
I want to learn, it looks so simple and fun. Must order this field guide.
Where can I find this book, I checked with Amazon, with. No luck
Love the Log Cabin Dishcloth
I enjoy all the different versions of the Log Cabin pattern. They are a wonderful test in color combinations and balance.