Would you be interested in finding instructions for a variety of interesting crochet projects, all of which are worked in a failsafe, classic color scheme that won’t have you agonizing over which colors to use? If so, Crochet in Black & White: Bold Two-Color Designs for You and Your Home is a book you’ll want to get your hands on.
What You Need to Know About This Crochet Pattern Book:
Authors: Constanze Diel-Hupfer and Magdalena Melzer
Publisher: Trafalgar Square Books
ISBN 13: 9781570767883
Book Formats: Softcover with perfect binding
Number of Pages: 112
Cover Price: $22.95 US dollars
The Focus of This Book:
This is a refreshing and multi-faceted collection of different crochet patterns. The designers created all the projects in this book using black and white yarn. Aside from sharing the same color scheme and having been designed by the same two pattern designers, these projects don’t have much in common with each other. There’s a broad diversity of techniques and project types included.
The Types of Crochet Techniques and Crochet Stitches You’ll Use to Create the Projects Found in This Book:
- Crochet stripes
- Crochet ripples, zigzags, chevrons and waves
- Granny squares
- Applique
- Crochet in the round
- Surface crochet
- Tapestry crochet
- Intarsia crochet
- Spiral crochet
- Mitered squares
- Crochet post stitches
- Crochet bobble stitches
- V stitches
Crochet Projects Included in This Book:
8 Fashion Crochet Projects: Clothing / Accessories
- 1 crochet hat with earflaps
- 1 pair of cuffs
- 1 crochet cowl
- 1 hooded garment (the hood is attached to a cowl-style shoulder wrap)
- 2 bags / purses
- 1 pair of mittens
- 1 pair of slipper socks
36 Crochet Projects for the Home:
The photos above give you a glimpse at a few of the home decor projects featured in this pattern book. Here’s a complete list of the home decor patterns you get in Crochet in Black and White:
- 1 pattern for crochet potholders
- 1 placemat pattern
- 1 coaster pattern
- 2 egg cozies / egg warmers
- 1 bread basket pattern
- 2 rug patterns
- 1 lampshade pattern
- 7 cushions / pillow patterns
- 4 crochet basket patterns
- 1 table runner pattern
- 4 candle shades
- 1 toilet cover
- 1 toilet paper cozy
- 1 hanging laundry basket
- 1 door stopper
- 4 wall art designs (3 small wall hangings and 1 larger mural)
- 1 DIY flower pot
- 2 vase covers
7 Miscellaneous Crochet Projects:
- 1 amigurumi snake that could either be a draft-stopper for the door or a toy for the kids
- 1 book cover
- 1 pincushion
- 2 stuffed hearts
- 1 phone case
- 1 tablet case
That gives you a whopping 51 projects to work on!
The Best Things About This Book
You saw the note above about this book having a total of 51 crochet projects to work on — right?
51 projects! For real! That’s roughly twice the amount of projects that you’ll find in your average crochet pattern book.
Of course, some of this book’s online retailers have recorded the number of projects as 31 rather than 51. That’s apparently because they’re counting the 4 candle shades as one project, the two vase covers as one project, etc.
15 of the projects in the book are ones I would definitely want to make for myself and my family. Another 3 of the projects are ones I’d want to make and give as gifts. Overall, I think most crafters will find multiple projects that appeal to them on the pages of this book.
This book offers an amazing diversity of project types, themes, crochet stitch patterns and techniques to try. There are music-themed designs, a skull design, three heart designs, geometric designs, interesting textured designs, fun ripple and zigzag designs and more.
There are absolutely no bad colorways in this book. When it comes to home décor and fashion accessories, it’s impossible to go wrong with a black and white color scheme.
However, you do not need to limit yourself to using only black and white yarns if you’d rather make your projects more colorful. These patterns are all exceptionally easy to re-color. I encourage you to get adventurous with your color combinations, particularly if your wardrobe mainstays are different colors and your home isn’t decorated in black and white already.
I am eyeing the zigzag drawstring bag and thinking I might like to try re-coloring it in a brighter colorway to give to my daughter. I’d like to make a black and white one, too, for myself.
The styling in this book is exceptional. The projects are presented simply and with minimal distractions. The items that are present in the pictures tend to enhance the scene and add additional insights. For example, the table runner project photo includes a bowl of cherries, which helps to give you a better idea of how big the piece is overall.
The fonts used in the book are easily readable to me despite my three-years-out-of-date eyeglasses prescription. I also appreciate the clarity of the charts, which are large enough to read easily.
Other Observations About This Book
This book includes over 50 color photographs, 22 diagrams and 50 illustrations plus a techniques section. The basic crochet stitches are included in the techniques section, plus there are illustrated instructions for how to work in spiral rounds, how to do a magic ring, how to make pompoms and more. If you’re rusty on your crochet skills or you’re a beginner, you’ll likely find these resources useful for getting you started on the projects found in the book.
Most of the photography in the book is thorough, helpful and high quality. There are a couple of exceptions.
The photo showing the entire crocheted book cover is an artistic shot, but parts of it are blurry. Thankfully, there is a close-up detail photo that shows you the two granny squares and the textured crochet stitch pattern.
The hooded cowl looks complicated, and it would have been nice to see a photo of the back of it — but that is not included anywhere that I could find.
Overall, it looks to me like the project photos included in the book are adequate to show you what you need to see in order to work each project.
Everything included in this book is right on-trend, starting with the color theme. Black and white is definitely a trendy color scheme for 2021. It’s also a classic, enduring color scheme, and most of the projects you make using these patterns are likely to remain stylish for decades. A couple of exceptions would be the cowl patterns, which are trendy designs that could possibly go outdated in a few years’ time — but they are on-trend now.
The designs in this book are charted out for you in either in international symbol crochet charts or tapestry crochet charts — a big, big plus, and a good reason to select this book over similar competing titles that don’t include charts.
However, some of the charts are placed in a section in the back of the book, which is kind of a bummer for those of you who like to work back and forth between the charts and the text of the pattern to get the clearest possible understanding. You’ll either have to make a photocopy of each chart you want to work from or cope with some flipping back and forth between the pattern texts and the charts in the back of the book.
Crochet Skill Level Required:
The team at Trafalgar Square Books has assigned the following skill level ratings to the patterns in this book:
- 10 of the patterns in this book are rated as easy ones.
- 18 of the patterns in the book are rated as being intermediate level.
- 5 of the patterns are rated as being for experienced crochet enthusiasts.
If I had been tasked with rating the projects in the book, I would have assigned skill level ratings of “Intermediate” to three of the ten patterns they rated as being “easy”; this is because the patterns in question all require mid-row color changes. They aren’t difficult to do, but they do take some practice to master.
Conclusion
Crochet in Black & White is an exciting book that I am delighted to recommend to other crochet enthusiasts — particularly crocheters who have reached at least an intermediate level with crochet. I make this recommendation because intermediate crocheters and experienced crocheters will get the most value from the book. I think the book is also a good value for confident beginners who have mastered the basic crochet stitches and are determined to work at reaching intermediate level. If you’re a beginner, I do think you could enjoy success with the projects in this book if you are willing to invest some effort in practicing your craft. I also think the projects in this book are creative, interesting and worth the effort.
This book is a spectacular value for its cover price, but you’ll likely be able to buy it for less than that. The retailers I’ve linked to below often sell books at discounted prices.
Where to Buy This Book:
Book Reviews of Other Trafalgar Square Crochet and Knitting Books:
- Carefree Crochet
- Crochet Granny Squares: Over 25 ways to crochet the classic pattern
- Jorid Linvik’s Big Book of Knitted Mittens
- Knit Yourself In
By Amy Solovay
About the Author: Amy Solovay is a real person; she is NOT a robot and does not use artificial intelligence (AI) to write articles for this website. She is a real, live, human content creator and educator who holds a bachelor’s degree with a studio art minor; she has also earned a separate degree in textile design. Amy learned to crochet as a small child, and she still enjoys crocheting all these years later. Beyond that, she enjoys introducing other crafters to the best new craft supplies, and she also loves helping crafters learn new techniques for making the most of the craft supplies they buy.
As an educator, Amy Solovay used to teach in-person college courses in trend forecasting, marketing and surface design at California Design College in Los Angeles.
Nowadays, Amy uses online platforms to teach digital courses to craft pattern designers, content creators and influencers all over the world. If you’re an artist, crafter or DIY enthusiast who is interested in earning income from your creative work, you’re invited to visit Crafterprise.com to learn more about monetizing the arts, craft(s) and / or DIY projects you do.
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This page was last updated on 10-4-2024.