If you've ever wanted a custom bobble hat but your knitting skills aren't up to par, let the robots do it. Researchers at MIT's Computer Science & Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) have developed a computer-aided knitting system which ca...
It’s one thing to learn how to sew, and it’s quite another to be able to customize the fabric with which you put your garments together. Up until now, if you wanted a particular pattern of material, you’d either have to crochet the darn thing, or pore over heaps of catalogues in the hopes to find what suits you. The Kniterate is a knitting machine that accepts pretty much any design you can throw at it, and recreates it for you in real life. You can either pick your patterns from pre-made templates, or create your own These then get output onto a knitting bed that’s 29 inches wide. The stitch density can easily be changed and up to 6 spools of yarn allow for extremely colorful patterns.
Granted, even though you can have this at home, with a starting price of $4,600 it’s not for the casual designer. If you’re building your design studio and wish to stand out early on though, you might want to give this a good look.
My Mamaw (that’s grandmother for you yankees out there) used to knit all the time. She was big on making blankets with yarn that had enough open space to be terrible at keeping you warm, and were itchy enough to drive you mad. Thankfully she was never into knitting sweaters so I never had to wear that itchy stuff all day long.
An interesting new device has turned up on Kickstarter called the Kniterate, and it could make Grandma’s knitting obsolete.
The computer-controlled knitting machine can make all sorts of stuff like dresses, sweaters, and even shoes, from a wide variety of yarns. It can knit garments in any pattern you can imagine, and is ideal for making one-off fashions or prototype designs for production.
Kniterate’s design application will include pre-made templates for a variety of garment structures, or you can design your own from scratch.
It’s not exactly cheap, with the first batch of machines selling for $4,699(USD). Despite the price, the campaign has already blown through its crowdfunding goal. Shipping is expected to start in April 2018. I only hope its blankets will keep you warm, and it uses yarns that aren’t itchy.
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The burgeoning small scale 3D printing industry is focused on producing plastic or metal objects. A small team of makers led by Gerard Rubio hopes to turn the spotlight on a more practical material: fabric. The OpenKnit is a work-in-progress open source printer that automatically knits thread to create clothing based on digital templates.
The printer is powered by an Arduino Leonardo and can control three needles at the same time. Like the pioneering RepRap, the OpenKnit printer itself will have parts that can be 3D printed to further save on costs. Gerard says the printer should cost around $750 (USD) to build.
Aside from the printer itself, OpenKnit also has a companion program called Knitic that can be used to design clothes. Knitic was developed by Mar Canet and Varvara Guljajeva, who used their experience from hacking old electronic knitting machines to create a user-friendly program for designing clothes. Finally, there’s Do-Knit-Yourself, a “virtual wardrobe” where people can share their designs. Think of the site as the Thingiverse of clothing.
Obviously, all three parts of the OpenKnit project are still in their infancy, and the clothes that have come out of it are not much to look at. But I hope the project takes off and democratizes fashion, because that industry badly needs a wake up call. Check out the OpenKnit website to learn more about the printer. Makers should head to Gerard’s Github page to find out how they can replicate the device.
If you grew up in the 80′s and now have kids, you have to do yourself a favour and get one of these. Knitted by one ‘TheLilliePad’ on Etsy, they’ll set you back between $32 and $38. Alternatively, you could buy the pattern for all of $6. Take into consideration that due to increased demand, you may end up waiting a while for them, during which you may as well take up some crocheting lessons…
The brew is strong with this one. Let Jedi Master Yoda keep your hands from scalding with this adorable Yoda Coffee Cup Cozy. I’m sorry- “Star Wars inspired” cozy- tell Goofy to call off the lawyers. You know that Yoda is renowned for his feats of coffee drinking- that’s what accounts for his stunted growth. Yeah, I went there….there is no try, my friends.
A couple of weeks ago we saw a crochet hook that looks like a lightsaber. This DIY project on the other hand gives you a knitting implement that looks like a lightsaber, except this time it also lights up. Not that you’d want to knit in the dark.
Instructables member Random_Canadian came up with the design. He used small LED flashlights as the base. He replaced the white LEDs in the flashlights with red and green, but you can pick whatever color you want. He then used acrylic rods as needles, because the rods focus and extend the light from the LEDs.
Force browse to Instructables to find out how you can make your own lightsaber knitting needles.
I’m not sure what exactly one would do with this knit Instagram Granny Square beside make an entire quilt of them, or a quilt of your favorite icons? Or perhaps you could take a picture of it with your phone and then apply a funky retro filter to it so it looks really cool before uploading it to your account on…..Flickr.
If you've ever wanted a custom bobble hat but your knitting skills aren't up to par, let the robots do it. Researchers at MIT's Computer Science & Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) have developed a computer-aided knitting system which ca...
In the sneaker industry, it normally takes around 12 to 18 months for a new clothing design to make it to store shelves. Adidas wants to shorten that wait to a matter of hours. To that end, the German fitness apparel company has opened a pop-up shop...
It's 50 degrees and raining here in San Francisco which, by West Coast standards, constitutes the second coming of Snowpacalypse. With this sort of weather the only rational choice is to stay inside and patiently wait for spring. But just because we'...
