Knitting
Knitting is the process of interlooping yarn to create textile fabric made of interconnected loops, done by hand, machine or both.
Knitting creates stitches: loops of yarn in a row; the loops are created with a pair of knitting needles, which can either be straight and cylindrical or in the round with plastic tubes or wire joining the ends of both. There are usually many active stitches on the needle at one time. Knitted fabric consists of a number of consecutive rows of connected loops that intermesh with the next and previous rows. As each row is formed, each newly created loop is pulled through one or more loops from the prior row and placed on the 'gaining needle' so that the loops from the prior row can be pulled off the other needle without unraveling.
Differences in yarn, needle size, and stitch type allow for a variety of knitted fabrics with different properties, including color, texture, thickness, heat retention, water resistance, and integrity. A small sample of knitwork is known as a swatch and helps the maker determine the gauge of the intended work.
Etymology of the words knit and knitting
There are several origins of the word knit and knitting which include the German derivation from the word "knutten", the Old Norse word "knytja", and the Old English words "cnyttan" and cnotta.Nålebinding is a fabric creation technique predating both knitting and crochet.
History and culture
Knitting is believed to be an evolution of the ancient craft of nålbinding, the Norwegian word for “needle binding.” Artifacts of this form of fabric making have been found in many regions including Egypt, China, Denmark, and Sweden, dating as far back as 4200 B.C.E. In nålbinding, fabric is created through forming loops and knots of yarn with a single needle. The exact origins of the invention knitting are unknown, however the earliest known examples are cotton socks dating from the 11th century, found in the remains of the city of Fustat, now part of Cairo.The first commercial knitting guilds appear in Western Europe in the early fifteenth century. The Guild of Saint Fiacre was founded in Paris in 1527 but the archives mention an organization of knitters from 1268. The occupation "cap knitter" was described Margaret Yeo, of London, in 1473 as these textile artists primarily produced knit caps and dyed stockings.
In 1589, William Lee of Nottinghamshire invented the first knitting frame, or stocking frame, which was an early form of the knitting machine. Lee petitioned Queen Elizabeth I for a patent but was denied due to the coarse nature of the frame-knit fabric and the fear that frame knitting would take away the jobs of hand knitters in England. Lee improved the knitting frame to accommodate a finer gauge, or number of stitches per inch, producing a smoother fabric, but his petition for a patent failed following the death of his court sponsor and apprentice, Lord Hunsdon, in 1596. Lee traveled to Normandy, France, and later Paris along with a group of apprentices in search of court sponsorship for his invention. After further trials and tribulations due to the assassination of King Henry IV in 1610, Lee was unable to establish a successful business in Paris. William Lee died in Paris in 1614, and his brother James Lee along with William's apprentice, Aston, adopted the petition to patent the knitting machine in England. By 1620, frame knitting was an established mode of production of knitted garments.
With the invention of the stocking frame, knitting "by hand" became a craft used by country people with easy access to fiber. Similar to quilting, spinning, and needlepoint, hand knitting became a leisure activity for the wealthy. English Roman Catholic priest and former Anglican bishop, Richard Rutt, authored a history of the craft in A History of Hand Knitting. His collection of books about knitting is now housed at the Winchester School of Art.
Differences and similarities between knitting and crocheting
When knitting by hand, usually two needles are used to hold the live stitches. By contrast, crochet uses a single hook, usually creating one stitch at a time, and finishes one stitch before creating the next. Knitted fabric tends to be flexible and flowing, the stitches forming a shape that is similar to a "V". Crochet fabric has a more structured feel, each stitch consisting of several loops entwined. Each textile has its specialties and methods. Because of the different nature of each stitch, crochet fabric uses more yarn per stitch, is more structured, and is more flexible in the structures that can be created, not being restrained to create a stitch in the following stitch. Knitted fabric tends to be thinner, more flexible, and usually has easier-to-understand patterns because each new stitch must go into the next stitch. Although different methods, they can create similar projects using the same fibers and yarns.Structure
Courses and wales
Like weaving, knitting is a technique for producing a two-dimensional fabric made from a one-dimensional yarn or thread. In weaving, threads are usually straight, running parallel either lengthwise or crosswise. By contrast, the yarn in knitted fabrics follows a meandering path, forming symmetric loops symmetrically above and below the mean path of the yarn. These meandering loops can be easily stretched in different directions giving knit fabrics much more elasticity than woven fabrics. To secure a stitch, at least one new loop is passed through it. Although the new stitch is itself unsecured, it secures the stitch suspended from it. A sequence of stitches in which each stitch is suspended from the next is called a wale.To secure the initial stitches of a knitted fabric, a method for casting on is used; to secure the final stitches in a wale, one uses a method of binding/casting off. During knitting, the active stitches are secured mechanically, either from individual hooks or from a knitting needle or frame in hand-knitting.
Depending on the yarn and knitting pattern, knitted garments can stretch as much as 500%. For this reason, knitting was initially developed for garments that must be elastic or stretch in response to the wearer's motions, such as socks and hosiery. For comparison, woven garments stretch mainly along one or other of a related pair of directions that lie roughly diagonally between the warp and the weft, while contracting in the other direction of the pair, and are not very elastic, unless they are woven from stretchable material such as spandex. Knitted garments are often more form-fitting than woven garments, since their elasticity allows them to contour to the body's outline more closely; by contrast, curvature is introduced into most woven garments only with sewn darts, flares, gussets and gores, the seams of which lower the elasticity of the woven fabric still further. Extra curvature can be introduced into knitted garments without seams, as in the heel of a sock; the effect of darts, flares, etc. can be obtained with short rows or by increasing or decreasing the number of stitches. Thread used in weaving is usually much finer than the yarn used in knitting, which can give the knitted fabric more bulk and less drape than a woven fabric.
If they are not secured, the loops of a knitted course will come undone when their yarn is pulled; this is known as ripping out, unravelling knitting, or humorously, frogging.
Weft and warp knitting
There are two major varieties of knitting: weft knitting and warp knitting. In the more common weft knitting, the wales are perpendicular to the course of the yarn. In warp knitting, the wales and courses run roughly parallel. In weft knitting, the entire fabric may be produced from a single yarn, by adding stitches to each wale in turn, moving across the fabric as in a raster scan. By contrast, in warp knitting, one yarn is required for every wale. Since a typical piece of knitted fabric may have hundreds of wales, warp knitting is typically done by machine, whereas weft knitting is done by both hand and machine. Warp-knitted fabrics such as tricot and milanese are resistant to runs, and are commonly used in lingerie.Weft-knit fabrics may also be knit with multiple yarns, usually to produce interesting color patterns. The two most common approaches are intarsia and stranded colorwork. In intarsia, the yarns are used in well-segregated regions, e.g., a red apple on a field of green; in that case, the yarns are kept on separate spools and only one is knitted at any time. In the more complex stranded approach, two or more yarns alternate repeatedly within one row and all the yarns must be carried along the row, as seen in Fair Isle sweaters. Double knitting can produce two separate knitted fabrics simultaneously. However, the two fabrics are usually integrated into one, giving it great warmth and excellent drape.
Knit and purl stitches
In securing the previous stitch in a wale, the next stitch can pass through the previous loop from either below or above. If the former, the stitch is denoted as a 'knit stitch' or a 'plain stitch;' if the latter, as a 'purl stitch'. The two stitches are related in that a knit stitch seen from one side of the fabric appears as a purl stitch on the other side.The two types of stitches have a different visual effect; the knit stitches look like 'V's stacked vertically, whereas the purl stitches look like a wavy horizontal line across the fabric. Patterns and pictures can be created in knitted fabrics by using knit and purl stitches as "pixels"; however, such pixels are usually rectangular, rather than square, depending on the gauge/tension of the knitting. Individual stitches, or rows of stitches, may be made taller by drawing more yarn into the new loop, which is the basis for uneven knitting: a row of tall stitches may alternate with one or more rows of short stitches for an interesting visual effect. Short and tall stitches may also alternate within a row, forming a fish-like oval pattern.
In the simplest of hand-knitted fabrics, every row of stitches are all knit ; this creates a garter stitch fabric. Alternating rows of all knit stitches and all purl stitches creates a stockinette stitch/stocking stitch pattern. Vertical stripes are possible by having alternating wales of knit and purl stitches. For example, a common choice is 2x2 ribbing, in which two wales of knit stitches are followed by two wales of purl stitches, etc. Horizontal striping is also possible, by alternating rows of knit and purl stitches. Checkerboard patterns are also possible, the smallest of which is known as seed/moss stitch: the stitches alternate between knit and purl in every wale and along every row.
Fabrics in which each knitted row is followed by a purled row, such as in stockinette/stocking stitch, have a tendency to curl—top and bottom curl toward the front while the sides curl toward the back ; by contrast, those in which knit and purl stitches are arranged symmetrically have more texture and tend to lie flat. Wales of purl stitches have a tendency to recede, whereas those of knit stitches tend to come forward, giving the fabric more stretchability. Thus, the purl wales in ribbing tend to be invisible, since the neighboring knit wales come forward. Conversely, rows of purl stitches tend to form an embossed ridge relative to a row of knit stitches. This is the basis of shadow knitting, in which the appearance of a knitted fabric changes when viewed from different directions.
Typically, a new stitch is passed through a single unsecured loop, thus lengthening that wale by one stitch. However, this need not be so; the new loop may be passed through an already secured stitch lower down on the fabric, or even between secured stitches. Depending on the distance between where the loop is drawn through the fabric and where it is knitted, dip stitches can produce a subtle stippling or long lines across the surface of the fabric, e.g., the lower leaves of a flower. The new loop may also be passed between two stitches in the 'present' row, thus clustering the intervening stitches; this approach is often used to produce a smocking effect in the fabric. The new loop may also be passed through 'two or more' previous stitches, producing a decrease and merging wales together. The merged stitches need not be from the same row; for example, a tuck can be formed by knitting stitches together from two different rows, producing a raised horizontal welt on the fabric.
Not every stitch in a row need be knitted; some may be 'missed' and knitted on a subsequent row. This is known as slip-stitch knitting. The slipped stitches are naturally longer than the knitted ones. For example, a stitch slipped for one row before knitting would be roughly twice as tall as its knitted counterparts. This can produce interesting visual effects, although the resulting fabric is more rigid because the slipped stitch 'pulls' on its neighbours and is less deformable. Mosaic knitting is a form of slip-stitch knitting that knits alternate colored rows and uses slip stitches to form patterns; mosaic-knit fabrics tend to be stiffer than patterned fabrics produced by other methods such as Fair-Isle knitting.
In some cases, a stitch may be deliberately left unsecured by a new stitch, and its wale allowed to disassemble. This is known as drop-stitch knitting, and produces a vertical ladder of see-through holes in the fabric, corresponding to where the wale had been.