I highly recommend this book on viking knit and ring maille. I first acquired this book after much debate nearly three years ago. It’s been a wild ride since then.
I purchased the book with the intention of learning viking knit because it looked neat. It wasn’t until earlier this year that I grabbed some copper-colored craft wire and a knitting knobby and started on my quest to learn this beautiful woven chain technique. I was distracted by the back half of the book, which involved ring maille. Somehow or other, I had completely missed this section as I was perusing the book in the craft store.
I remember being deliriously happy in this discovery. So happy that I couldn’t stop giggling for several minutes. I acquired some jump rings and pliers a couple of days later and sat down to try out a pattern. I wish I had a picture of my first attempted piece. I had some 12-gauge rings I was planning to fashion into a coif for a friend on hand, so I grabbed them and the book and sat down to make the very fascinating byzantine pattern*.
My first piece was this heavy duty segment of byzantine that I placed leather thongs on to fashion a choker. I even made my own end caps for it. I was very proud of myself, but I wasn’t content. I grabbed the smaller craft rings I had purchased and some rose quartz beads. The pattern I had said nothing about embellishing the chain with beads, but I figured I’d see what I could do, armed with my newfound knowledge. The result two hours later was this long standing favorite in my personal collection If you surf around the galleries, you’ll see I’ve also done a slight variation on it. I just love this chain!
This embellished byzantine chain was the beginning of my jewelry design career. I started teaching myself more chain patterns. I picked up a wire jig and taught myself wire wrapping. I even resurrected my old childhood friendship bracelet hobby to introduce more twists into my designs. Somewhere or other, I have this fascinating piece that features segments of byzantine connected to each other by short square knots sennits.
At any rate, this book was the launchpad for me to grow into this craft and to eventually start working on starting this business. It’s simple. It’s well-written. The photgraphs are very useful. Simply put, I found it inspiring! Writing this actually reminds me that I have several untapped design opportunities that need to find their way into my old design to-do list.
* It should be noted that this chain pattern has many names: byzantine, bird cage, jester’s box, fool’s box, etc. I call it byzantine because that’s the name I learned when I was first learning this pattern.
