Fun
A Pattern Party is Coming: Nominations, Please!
Fun ahead!
If you’ve been hanging out here at MDK for a while, you know that for the past few years we’ve hosted a friendly pattern competition, called March Mayhem, inspired by a popular college basketball tournament here in the US.
This year, we’re changing it up. We’re adopting a looser format that we hope will make this March even more of a celebration of the fantastic knitting patterns that were published in 2020. It will be like March Mayhem, but with more mayhem. Less competition, more input from knitters about their favorite designs, and more eye candy for everyone.
We’re calling this shindig Pattern Party.
Pattern Party will be a celebration of the designers who knocked it out of the park in the past year. Some of them will be new, or new to us, and some will be designers who have been turning out hits for years.
You have an important role to play: nominating. You will be our eyes, ears, and needles as we celebrate the most intriguing, beautiful, exciting knitting patterns of 2020.
Help Us Find the Great Patterns of 2020
Aside from having a rollicking good time discovering new patterns to knit, the main goal of our Pattern Party is to celebrate the work of independent designers, and show off wonderful examples of good design.
There are so many patterns published in a year that a diamond can easily disappear into the rough.
So we ask your help today. Help us find the great patterns of 2020!
What Patterns Qualify?
- Pattern must have been published for the first time during 2020.
- Pattern must be a paid pattern, or published in a paid publication. No free patterns, please. (One goal here is to put actual dollars in the pockets of these designers, by boosting pattern sales.)
- Pattern must be available by download, or otherwise readily available for purchase. It can’t be in a publication that is no longer for sale, for example.
- Any category is eligible. Knitting patterns tend to sort themselves into broad categories, such as Sweaters, Accessories, Socks, and Home Decor, but there are no limits here. If you think a pattern is outstanding, nominate it.
How to Suggest a Pattern
Editor’s Note: Nominations are now closed. Join us for Pattern Party starting March 29!
- Fill out our handy Pattern Party form. Please do not leave a comment on this post with your pattern suggestion. We will avidly look at everything, and the form will help us keep it all straight.
- Please submit just one form. It’s hard, but you can do it!
- Deadline for nominations: Sunday, February 28, 11:59 pm Central time.
While our format is changing, the spirit will be the same: to have a great time thinking about the folks who are providing us with such brilliant things to make. Knitting would be no fun without them.
What’s Next?
As in years past, it will take us a few weeks to sort through nominations so we can present a fresh and festive flock of patterns to you. The party will start on Monday, March 29, when we begin a week of showing off patterns that received lots of knitterly love in the nominations. While we won’t be bound to a strict numerical limit as we were under the bracket format, we will still want to keep the collection small enough that each design gets its share of the limelight.
We’re really looking forward to sharing the best of 2020’s designs with you. We have a feeling that “want-to-knit” queues are going to balloon this Spring!
This has made me so extremely happy. I am HERE for more mayhem and I may even nominate this year. I actually scrolled down through MDKs Instagram last week to see around when the announcement was last year in case you weren’t up for doing it this year and the time had already passed. You have made my day (again).
I was just wondering about March Mayhem as I walked yesterday! Patterns don’t have to be something we’ve actually knitted yet, right? I’ve been buying lots of patterns this year just to help support people, but as usual my knitting is quite a bit slower than my accumulating…..
So there will not be voting and elimination rounds until there is one “winner”, right? Because they’re ALL winners!
Do you have a list of the 2019 winners?
I love this portion of your company-
Last year , as a result of the March Mayhem, I purchased the Felix Sweater and Woodland Loafers patterns. I am certain, I would not have found these wonderful patterns without the highlight from you. Thank you for this service! I am looking forward to seeing all the new suggestions for this year
There’s a link to the patterns of 2019 and the complete bracket with each set of winners in the article.
I feel like an idiot, but I bet others do as well. How the heck do I figure out the URL for a Ravelry pattern? I’ve just spent way too much time with this, lol. Mere mortal here!
Monica, I did a sort of the kind of knits I favor, add, any gauge, etc. and one of the categories is publish date, & I put 2020. ( saved it as Top Down, any gauge adult published 2020 )(I hope I have described this correctly & I hope it helps)
I’ve concentrated on a particular designer in 2020, but now I need to decide which pattern to nominate. Looking forward to reviewing the patterns and choosing!
Exclusive to knitting and not crochet, correct?
This should be very interesting. In the meantime, I need to block the body of my Oban Cardigan, seam the shoulders and work on the sleeves. As soon as I saw it last year, I knew it would win.
That’s right!
Is there an easy way on Ravelry to filter for 2020 patterns only?
Go to the pattern search page, pull up the filter search, and allll the way at the bottom of the list is ‘year published’
Just cut and paste the link which is located at the top of the page in the header bar
When you’re on the pattern page, highlight and copy whatever appears in the address bar of your browser. That’s the URL.
Thanks! The issue was doing this in my tablet. I finally figured it out.
Love, love, love!
One thing I did after last year’s March Mayhem to help me find patterns for this year’s contest was to create a a bundle on Ravelry called, you guessed it, March Mayhem. Whenever I “favourite” a pattern on Ravelry now that I think would be appropriate, I also save it to my March Mayhem bundle – makes it a lot easier to find qualifying patterns now!
That is pure genius #MarchMayhem
So no more voting? 🙁 That’s a bummer.
I’m with with you, Kelly. I was looking forward to voting.
So glad you’re doing this! Thank you — I’m really looking forward to some intense fantasy-knitting. I wish you’d allow free patterns, though — my No. 1 nomination would be the amazing multi-steek sweater from Knitty. Since I can’t nominate it, I’m putting it here. https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/halmstad
But Knitty pays its designers right?
That design has really got me thinking about possibilities! Gradient sweaters without having to figure out how much yarn to put aside for the sleeves, for a start. Thank you!
What an excellent use of your bully pulpit! I put in a nomination .
Oh good way to offer it for this crazy year! Thanks! Looks like fun!
Dang, it was hard enough last year to only nominate two, and now you guys want me to decide on only one?? I’m not decisive enough for this 😉
Oh crap, I submitted my nomination, then found out that it’s free. Sorry. .
When can we expect the fun to start?