Booking Your Next Knitting Project

I came across the above photo on the net, and its sheer awesomeness made me decide to seek out other knitted book covers and do a knitted book cover post. You won't want to knit every book you own a book cover, of course, but it might be nice to make one for a gift, to make your journal or your chequebook or your daytimer look worthy of belonging to a knitter, to protect a beloved yet crumbling book, or to camouflage the fact that you're reading trashy novels from everyone on the bus, your children, or the Mother Superior of your convent.

And may I also suggest cotton covers? Because, though you may not be one to feel the heat like I do, I cannot imagine anyone wanting to so much as touch a wool-covered book in July (or in the height of summer whenever that is where you live). Please excuse me while I peel my arms off my desk. They got stuck while I was typing this.

The above book cover was created by Craftivore, and she provides details on the Ravelry page for the project. There doesn't, sadly, seem to be a pattern available, and it won't be easy to recreate it. Just look at that detail!

And this inside detail! I love the wit and the bookishness and the colour sense and the sheer level of craft and care that went into this project. I did not, as one might expect, find another book cover to equal this one, but I did find some quite attractive ones.

This sketchbook cover by Veronik Avery is really quite something. It's available as a download for $5.50.

This notebook cover by Jane Burns is also very eye-catching. This pattern is available as a download for £2.99.

This cat motif notebook by Julia Brice is simple but cute. I'd do the cat in an angora or a mohair. It's a free pattern.

If you're a Dr. Who fan, this book cover from The Fantasy Intellectual is for you. The pattern is free.

If you're partial to classic cables, you could always go with a pattern like this cabled one, which appeared in Carri Hammett's Ready, Set, Knit Cables: Learn to Cable with 20 Designs and 10 Projects.

And it would be easy to make your own pattern in any colour, pattern, texture or size you wish, since they are really just simple rectangles.