Continental vs. American Knitting Styles

Video Transcript

"Before I teach you how to knit, I want you to understand that there are two ways people hold their yarn and hold their knitting needles. And it's the Continental or the European way, or the American way. And it sounds like it'd be a feud. You know, the pickers or the throwers. So for the Continental way, which is personally how I knit, you've got your yarn and you wrap it around your pinky, and then around your fingers. And it runs over the top of your forefinger. Your right hand needle goes in the stitch. You wrap it around using your forefinger to guide the tension and you bring it through. And the yarn never moves off of your finger. The yarn around the needle and through. So for this method it's very fluid. It's very even tension. And your yarn just keeps going over and the tension is running through your fingers. For the American way, yarn is still always going to be your working yarn on your needles in your left hand. And your needle you are knitting onto in your right hand. But for the American knitters, what they do, is they hold the yarn and the needles in their right. In their left hand and they wrap the yarn around the needle and bring it through. So this takes a little more energy. And people do get faster with it. But in my opinion its more effort. I have friends who call this aerobic knitting because you're working more with your hands. So you see, compared to the European way or the Continental way, this takes a little more time."