When Patterns Go Bad

Dear Knitwear Designer,

First off, congratulations on becoming a designer. Most of us can't figure out how a pattern works, never mind actually create a garment out of our heads. Well, actually you create garments out of yarn, but you know what I meant.

Secondly thank you for offering your brilliance to the rest of us. It's great that we can buy patterns directly from the designer and sometimes you even give your work away for free! That's quite generous and I have no idea why you would do that other than to get your name out there, but we all thank you for it.

Now may I offer some suggestions? I don't mean to criticize - okay, yes I do. But it's only because I work in a craft store and I see the frustration and bewilderment on our customers faces when they come in with a pattern that they got from you, dear designer.

As a writer I know how important the details are. It doesn't matter if I have the greatest story to tell, if I can't use proper punctuation and spelling, my readers will throw my book across the room and vow never to read my work again. There are plenty of other writers out there who can use punctuation and spelling and readers will go buy their books instead of mine.

And the same goes for you, dear designer. You may have created the most exquisite shawl, the coziest sweater, the funkiest socks, or the most marvelous scarf/hat/mitten set, but if people can't read your patterns, they will throw them across the room and find a designer who also makes beautiful exquisite designs and good readable patterns. Now if your patterns are as easy to understand as your garments are beautiful, then you will have customers coming back to you over and over again and you will become rich and famous and have yarn given to you by the exclusive companies around the world while the rest of us deal with our jealousy.

So I'm going to give you some pointers on what is essential in a pattern and I give this to you both as a knitter/crocheter, and as an employee in a yarn shop.

1.  Your yarn. 
1. By all means tell us what yarn you used. Saying Red Heart is not telling us the yarn. Red Heart is a brand name. Red Heart has a thousand or so yarns under it's brand name. You need to be specific. Tell us the brand name, the name of the yarn, and the color. 
2. It is important to tell us the weight of the yarn. Is it a DK, a worsted, a fingering? Knitters more often than not have to substitute yarn and it helps to know what to substitute with. There are a lot of reasons for substitutions. Price, availability, contents (lots of customers are sensitive to wool or they want to go organic) and color are just some of the reasons why substitutions need to be made. In five years that lovely yarn you used may be long discontinued. Personally I have patterns from decades ago, and even from the 1800's. Don't you want your pattern to be around for a long time? Then you need to give information for substitutions.
3. Tell us what the yarn you used is made of. Again important for those who might have allergies.
4. Is there anything special about this yarn? If this is a basic yarn then you don't need to say anything, but if it is a specialty yarn, then we need to know. Is it a fuzzy yarn? A chenille? Does it have long color changes or short ones?
2. Tools
1. Americans designers are especially guilty of this. Saying "size 5" needles is not enough. Is that American, metric, or UK? Give us at least the metric size as well for those who live outside of the states. And if you use metric then let the Americans know the size in their language. Hey, I didn't create the system, I'm just trying to function in it.
2. If a circular is necessary then state the length of the cord needed. In metric and inches. If you did the pattern on double points then tell us that. Give as much information about needle and hook sizes as possible (yes, crochet hooks have American and metric sizes as well).
3. Sizing
1. Tell us the gauge. Especially in sweaters, socks and hats where fit counts. And tell us the finished sizes. I'm currently working on a sweater where the finished size isn't mentioned. Yes, I know. It's stupid but the sweater looks so cool. So now after realizing that it's going to be too small I have to make adjustments. It's a one size fits all, only it doesn't fit anyone unless you're a size 0 model. Give us dimensions of the front, back and sleeves if it's a sweater. The more parts, the more dimensions needed. 
4. Abbreviations
1. Sure you know exactly what you're talking about when you give abbreviations. But you don't know if your fans do. K and P are pretty basic, but beyond that, you need to make a list of all your abbreviations and what they mean. Do you really want your knitters to have to search the internet to read your patterns? They might get sidetracked by the kitten videos and never get around to your pattern because you made it too hard to read and the kitten videos are easy to watch. So if you really want to knit from the back twice and then in the same stitch purl into the front and then jump up and down three times and then pull everything through, then you have to explain this and not just write down kb2pfj3pt. If you make your abbreviations chart at the beginning of the pattern then you can use your abbreviations to your heart's content and even make up some of your own. And by the way, you crochet designers are not exempt. English and American abbreviations are different. Don't ask me why, they just are.
2. If you have difficult directions then you might consider offering a video that they can watch. Still explain on the pattern itself, but you can direct your knitter to your video. 
5. THIS IS REALLY IMPORTANT
1. Just like writers need editors and readers to find their mistakes - no writer is perfect and when you've read the same sentence over and over again you end up reading it the way it's supposed to read, not the way it really does - you need to have another knitter proof read your pattern. Maybe that means they actually have to make the piece. That way they can say to you "What does this mean?" and then you can tweak that instruction so any dummy knitter can understand it. 

I think that's it. I hope I haven't caused anyone to start throwing around knitting needles exclaiming "She just doesn't understand artistes!"

Hopefully we can tame those patterns and turn them around from badness to goodness so they can be responsible citizens in the yarn world. Otherwise they will be tossed aside and forgotten while the well-behaved patterns get the rewards.