By Afya Ibomu
Published by The Taunton Press
Afya Ibomu is a holistic health counselor with a penchant for craftiness. Her 70′s inspired cool crochet hats are pretty sought after among the reggae and hip hop crowd. She has a website which has her holistic health info as well as crochet advice and hats for sale. Online pattern for a mesh hat, and the hats in her online store gives you an idea of her style and what to expect in her book.
The book is all about funky reggae 70′s style crochet with soul! While many of these hats are not exactly suited to an Aussie white girl like me, that is certainly not true for everybody, and there are many patterns that I would actually wear, and the fact that they are quite versatile with good directions and best of all fun, all leads me to want to try a few of them out.
Like all good craft books the first part begins with the basics, tools, colour, yarn, and the crochet stitches, with lovely clear illustrations to get you started. The next bit I really like, adding extras to your basic hat like a bib or bill (the peak of a baseball cap), ear flaps, pom poms, and fringe. What a great idea, you start off with a basic hat and adjust and personalise it to suit.
The main part of the book is all about the patterns, with good photos of not only the finished product but a few images of it along the way. Always helpful I think. Some of of the basic designs that I thought I might try include ‘Mellow Moods’ a 70′s cinema inspired hat with brim all around. ‘The MC’, a classic baseball cap, very cutely modelled by a little boy and a grown man, the ‘Kool Rock Ski’, a fab cap with long long earflaps that you wrap around your neck or just wear long, and the ‘skully’ a basic style versatile cap. Some funkier designs that I really liked include ‘The Queen’ a traditional african pattern that is half hat and half scarf, it fits nicely around the skull and then ties at the back, great for long hair, with some wonderful directions of different ways of wearing and tying it. I love the ‘Soon Come’ a newsboy-style cap with a squarish shape which is really different. The “O.G’ is a mens style sort of 20′s gangster hat, that would work equally for women. There are a few more unusual hats designed specifically for dreadlocks or big afro hair include the ‘Notty Dread’, a really tall cap, the ‘Kinky Reggae’ pattern available on the website, is a mesh style big hat, for big hair or as a bun holder. The ‘Jam Pony’ are fun, fringed hair wraps for long hair or dreads.
Lots and lots more patterns in here, really original and fun.
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This is one of the nicest books I have seen on hats and caps. Not only are the patterns wonderful, but there are great crochet basic intructions with pictures. I really love this book.