Fun
Get Ready: MDK March Mayhem Update
Dear everybody who loves a good knitting pattern,
To be clear: the new MDK March Mayhem 2020 bracket won’t be published until Friday, March 13.
The beautiful gallery you’re seeing up top shows designs from last year’s MDK March Mayhem—the world’s only online pattern championship.
But we wanted to give you an update, mostly because we are making the Mayhem right now, and it’s feeling a bit like Lucy and Ethel, toward the end of their shift in the chocolate factory.
At this point, we have looked at probably 2,000 knitting patterns, all published in 2019.
Among them are the hundreds of patterns we discovered because readers answered our call for nominations. Thank you to everyone who took the time to shine a spotlight on a design that they love—it never ceases to amaze us, seeing the creativity and skill of these designers.
We are still in the process of selecting the patterns that will be in the running to become Champion of MDK March Mayhem 2020. Let’s just say that we are having heartfelt conversations, sharing frank and open opinion, and making a lot of impossible choices in order to arrive at the bracket of 64 patterns, in four categories.
Friday, March 13 will be here soon. So mark your calendars, get ready to vote your heart out for your favorites.
Most of all, we encourage you to get your Mayhem knitting game set now.
A Tender Look Back at the Brackets
We suggest you spend some quality time with the MDK March Mayhem bracket from last year. It serves as a brilliant road map to designs that made 2018 a stellar year for handknit design.
Have a look, right here.
And here’s the bracket for the designs from 2017, right here.
One of the things we love about MDK March Mayhem is that it celebrates designers both new and seasoned. It’s interesting to see how many of these designs are now classics. And how many designers are growing and finding new audiences.
Go ahead and pick a hat, a scarf, a sweater to make during MDK March Mayhem. It’s going to be so, so good.
Love,
Ann and Kay
I love March Madness!!! Can’t wait!!!
the link for the 2017 bracket goes to 2018 too!
can’t wait for the new bracket!
Sorry for the confusion, Ben! Each year’s competition features patterns published in the previous year–so Mayhem 2019 features patterns from 2018, and Mayhem 2018 features patterns from 2017.
I appreciate all the work you put into this. I remember Ravelry bundles for past brackets, and haven’t been able to find them. Any ideas how to find them again? Thank you!
The links are actually to 2019 and 2018. I think this Madness didn’t start until 2018. Such fun to look back at all those great patterns!
Mdk March Madness is such fun. I love being exposed to designers and patterns that are new to me. I love talking about it when others start talking about basketball. In most gatherings there will be someone who eagerly joins the conversation.
What would be helpful would be an indication of difficulty for the patterns in the headings!
Where are you today, Ann and Kay? It is Feb. 25 and we miss you!
If you click on an entry, then click “view on Ravelry,” it takes you to the pattern page on Ravelry which includes an average difficulty rating by the knitters who have made it.
How did I miss the call for patterns??? I would like to recommend Enchanted Forest by Knits with Chocolate. I tried to paste the link, but it won’t paste:(. It’s on Ravelry. The one that enthralled me is the blue one with winter white leaves, knit in Rowan Felted Tweed. Just the name draws me in! Thanks:)
That is a beautiful pattern with such interesting variations too! Thank you for mentioning it. I too like the blue and white version. It is…enchanting. : )
I’m new to this! How does it work? FYI I had no idea but, I made Humulus in 2018!
Basically, it’s a contest like basketball’s March Madness, where we readers vote on which pattern(s) “win” each round. So for round 1, we’ll get to vote for which 32 patterns should advance to round 2. Then we’ll get to vote which 16 advance to round 3, and so on. It’s a great way to get exposure for lots of cool patterns published the year before.
Thank you! What fun!
so are we picking the pattern we like the best or the one we plan to make (that could be the same or different)
March Madness—my favorite!
I love this event. Last year I enjoyed all of the entries. I spent the rest of the year making my favorites! Cannot wait! Thanks MDK for doing this and ALL you do for our knitting community!
I, too, love March Madness! This year I plan to pick a favorite design (or two!) and order the yarn for it from MDK. I’m working through stash, but It is worth breaking my yarn diet to support Kay and Ann for giving me something I enjoy so much. Thank you MDK!
What a great idea! I’m on a serious yarn diet, too, but March Madness has alerted me to so many great patterns, many of which become FO’s. If I get yarn for a March Madness pattern from MDK, just to show support & appreciation to such great pattern curators & all around fun people, that isn’t breaking my diet, right?
Went to an event recently where one of the participants wore a cozy dark sweater during the day and upped her look with a similar garment in a glowing red at night. Made me want the same! Then I clicked on your bracket for 2017 and Veronika jumped out at me. It is a lot of knitting but with so many FO’s it might be the perfect answer. Thanks for the reminder of great suggestions from the recent past.
Wheee! I can hardly wait. And thank you for posting the link for the 2017 patterns. I especially loved those and couldn’t figure out how to retrieve them.
Cd u do a class on figuring put YOUR GAUGE
Eagerly waiting for MDKMM to commence! I love looking at all the patterns, marveling at how many of them are already in my cart, or my queue (or both) or even my FOs, and I also like the idea that Indie designers get additional exposure from this process. I always try to pick up at least one new pattern from your brackets.