Hello and welcome to my book, Crochet Illusion Blankets . My name is Helen and I have passion for anything crochet related! I am a mum of two beautiful daughters and a wife to my lovely husband. My husband is the reason why I first picked up a crochet hook: we were holidaying in North Wales for his 40th birthday and we went into a lovely little shop that had lots of wool and hooks and I decided to give it a go because I have always admired the art of crochet, just never tried it. I then watched a YouTube video back at our holiday house and made a hat for each of my daughters, and I have never looked back. It's pretty unusual for me if I don't do some sort of crochet each day with my two little doggies by my side. I have a varied background in crochet, but my first love is blankets and I just love that I can make an idea in my head into a reality, and sometimes even make a drawing come to life through crochet. I started designing back in 2020 when we were all going through lockdown. Since then my work has been in several crochet magazines, I've been a guest designer for Bella Coco Crochet, I've designed blankets and other items for yarn brands, and the contents for a monthly subscription box for the Crochet Society. However, my biggest achievement to date is in writing this book, and I have to pinch myself every time I remember that I am on this amazing journey. I will be forever grateful for everyone's help and support. But where did the idea of illusion crochet come from? Well, it all started with the memory of something I used to study in maths at school, called parabolic curves. I used to draw them all the time at home in so many variations, and when I took up designing crochet, I decided to try and recreate a parabolic curve in the form of a blanket design. That's when my crochet illusion blanket idea was born! This book contains everything you need to know about making the 15 crochet illusion blanket projects. Each blanket is created using the intarsia crochet technique and through the course of the book I will not only explain this technique, but also take a look at how to choose colours that will work and explain how to arrange your yarn while making a blanket. Each pattern includes full written instructions as well as a colour chart. The best thing about the blankets, though, is that all of them are made with the same stitch, and it's simply the clever arrangement of the changing colours that creates the beautiful optical illusions! Excerpted from Crochet Illusion Blankets: 15 Patterns for Optical Illusion Crochet Blankets, Afghans and Throws by Helen Smith All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
