the blue blog archives: what's this?

I got a question in the comments about sweater design software. I have to admit that I don't even know what's out there. Does anyone have any experience using these programs that they want to share? All I know I learned from studying other patterns and reading Maggie Rigetti's Sweater Design in Plain English and Cheryl Brunett's Sweater 101 workshop. And if you're looking for a sleeve tutorial, you've got to check out Jenna Wilson's awesome Knitty articles on sleeve design here and here!

posted by alison at 5:57 pm | in magknit

Comments

Oh boy, the fun stuff :)

Posted by: Vicki at February 6, 2005 7:55 PM

I've used Knitware Sweater design. It doesn't do anything really complicated, but it takes the work out of figuring out set-in sleeves and neck shaping, and makes it easy to just plug in design elements and your gauge and go. I use it in particular for my husband's sweaters -- plain and classic, with minimum shaping. We just choose a nice stitch pattern and a "manly" colour and plug in his measurements -- it's worked very well so far. I don't know how it would work for more fancy designs, though.

Posted by: Aven at February 6, 2005 11:04 PM

Those articles look like a thesis. Wow.
I am not using any software, more like trial and error - I know, not very scientific.

Posted by: Grauwal at February 7, 2005 1:02 AM

what was the first thing you ever designed? I really want to try it but I feel kind of scared to jump in.

Posted by: Anna at February 7, 2005 6:43 AM

I would love to use a sweater design program (if nothing else than as a jumping-off point), but alas, none of them seem to run on a Mac. And I gotta admit, I kinda like doing all the math by hand. As if I've actually done a sweater design before. Yeah.

Posted by: chris at February 7, 2005 9:45 AM

There's something out there called sweaterwizard. (http://www.software4knitting.com/) I haven't tried it myself, but I keep looking at it! Here are some of the features (http://www.software4knitting.com/psweaterwizard/knitfeat.htm)

Posted by: tania at February 7, 2005 11:31 AM

I use Sweater Wizard (at work shhhh since I have a Mac at home) and I adore it. The latest version in particular is great - lots of new features, and any time there is a problem (I stumbled on a loop that locked up the program) you can post it to the software designer's forum and she fixes it almost immediately (mine within a day!) Really great support, and a great place to set up patterns to play with, or as someone said above, for basic classics without having to think about the sleeve caps, etc.

Posted by: Karen at February 7, 2005 1:02 PM

I've been having a grand ol' time with The Knitter's Handy Book of Sweater Patterns by Ann Budd. I feel I could make almost anything reading that book.

Oh, and my Lauralund is done and pictured!

Posted by: LauraA at February 7, 2005 1:18 PM

I have an old version of the Cochenille Garment designer. I found it to be a great tutorial for learning basic garment construction, but when it came down to figuring out the numbers it was just too mathematical and not practical. Really who wants to make 7.5 decreases every one row 8 times, 2 rows 20 times...you get the idea. I think there are some great design books out there that I would refer to before I'd recommend Garment Designer, but it really is the only software I am familiar with. There may be a better one out there.

Posted by: Libby at February 7, 2005 4:04 PM

I too am a big fan of Sweater Wizard. Very user-friendly, very intuitive. It helps with tricky calculations if you want to, say, knit set-in sleeves down from the shoulders or base a pattern on a storebought sweater that fits well. Recently it has saved me from disaster caused by a poorly conceived and engineered published pattern.
Love your blog, by the way!

Posted by: Laura at February 7, 2005 4:34 PM

Thanks so much for the info. I was really hopping there was some great program out there every one was using. I will check out Sweater Wizards. The other book references I have seen are: The
knitter's Guide to Sweater Design - Designing
Knitwear

For Software these are the ones I have ready about: Sweater
Wizard - Knitware Basics - Knitware
- Knitware Design Software
Janet Tombu - Softbyte - Aran
Paint - Garment
Styler - Organized Expressions
- Sock Wizzard
- Stitch
& Motif Maker

Posted by: Kitty Kitty at February 7, 2005 6:48 PM

Thanks for the feedback on the design programs, folks. And thanks for all the links Kitty Kitty! I'll have to find some time to check them all out.

But I'm kinda with you Chris, I like doing the math by hand. I know what's going on that way!

Posted by: alison at February 8, 2005 12:18 PM