How To
New! MDK Patterns Library
Updating a website is a situation where the carrot and stick approach is really in play. As we worked on the redesign, there were plenty of sticks: a lot of back-end functionalities needed improvement, or else!
But there was one beautiful, dangling carrot that kept us motivated to get to launch day. It was a new feature that we really wanted: a Patterns page.
In the navigation bar on the MDK homepage, the Patterns tab sits at the right hand of the MDK logo. Click on it, and you will find yourself in a place where you can browse dreamily for your next project, and you can also find information and help for the patterns you’ve already cast on.
Let’s take a look around!
The Main Patterns Page
With 23 Field Guides published (and counting down to No. 24), there are a lot of MDK patterns to choose from, and now you can find them all. On the left side of the screen, you can search the patterns by Field Guide, category (type of knitwear), yarn or yarn weight (you know you bought that Atlas to make something, but what was it again?), or needle size.
Or if you’re browsing, you can use the “sort by” menu on the upper right to re-order the patterns by date of publication or alphabetically by name.
Can you save patterns? Yes, just log into your MDK account and use the little bookmark icon to save a pattern to your MDK account, the same way you would save a post. Handy!
Let’s Look at an Individual Pattern Page
Here’s what you’ll find when you click on one of the patterns from the main Patterns page.
Sharing buttons on the left, and vital pattern details on the right, with a handy button that takes you to where you can buy the Field Guide.
Scroll down the page, and there’s even more useful information, including finished measurements, gauge, pattern notes, and the colors used for the sample.
Keep scrolling, and you’ll find links to other content on MDK that supports the pattern. We made this content for you, and now it’s easy to find, all in one place. Shop links, how-tos and tutorials, and posts about our own experience of knitting the pattern. Less time searching for what you need means more knitting time!
Two essential links are at your fingertips on every pattern page: how to contact us, and the corrections page.
Onward!
We hope this new feature will make it that much easier to knit with us. The Patterns feature is a work in progress, and we welcome your feedback on how it’s working for you.
Thanks
Finally, a giant shout out to Allison Volek Shelton and Cristina Shiffman, who took on the huge project of mining a mountain of MDK posts to build these pages for you. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
You are so responsive to your audience. Thank you for this incredibly easy to navigate database, excellent work.
Fabulous!!! The ability to easily find a pattern alone is great, but the additional info about the pattern and all of the links to yarn, how-tos, and articles puts it over the top! Thank you for all the blood, sweat and tears you all have invested in building a robust, user friendly website!
This feature is going to be unbelievably helpful and will save us all hours. Hours we can use for more knitting!!
This is the absolute best! Thanks to all who worked on this.
Ah. Things I was going to do today—they’ll wait. My screen time will be alarmingly elevated this week. Looks luscious at first glance. Thank you for your monumental effort.
This is so great! Thanks to you all for your work to make this complex but user friendly improvement!
Absolutely Genius!!! So much easier to navigate. Have already spent an hour this morning playing with your new site! I got lost down the rabbit hole! I’ll never get any knitting done at this rate. Thank you for this innovative tool.
I took a few minutes to flip around in your new online set up and everything looks very nice but I still can’t find laundry instructions for the yarn you sell. Am I totally blind or is this not important to other people? I’m not investing (and your yarn is an investment for me) in your products without knowing how to wash them. Good job on the website update, however. It does look nice.
I absolutely love this patterns page! I spent countless hours flipping through all 23 books at times looking for a pattern or a yarn. This will be easier to navigate as I can shop anywhere not on the floor in front of the bookcase looking through little books. Great job.
Thank you to all who worked on the Patterns page. A very useful upgrade. One thought: my mind immediately went to ‘how nice would it be to search by designer’, but when I checked, that sorting capability is not available. Could that be added?
Would you believe that after all these months of working on this project, searching by designer only occurred to me when we were writing this post? That would be a very useful feature and we will try to get it implemented, please stay tuned!
So very helpful. I A ever know what yarn to use for patterns .
I just took this for a test drive. I am finally making the Shakerag Top. I tried to save the pattern page, but was unsuccessful. If at first you don’t succeed…..
Under the heading: “can there really be too much of a good thing?” since the new website launch I’m receiving two mdk emails a day.
Glitches happen! We’re working on it, but you might see dupes for a day or two longer.
Me too!
Thank you. This looks great!
I also am receiving 2 emails a day, and they are both the same. Hopefully, you can correct this. Thanks.
Me too, but in it is better than not getting any.
Glitches happen! We’re working on it, but you might see dupes for a day or two longer.
Wow! That’s awesome!
Love the new site and the pattern feature is wonderful. I have all the field guides but having all the information related to each pattern grouped together on your website makes it so convenient. Thank you
Fantastic idea…what a great job you have all done in making this such a user friendly site..thanks so much!
Kath not Katj
How do you save favorites now?
This is wonderful….I have all the FieldGuides…which I love. .,sometimes it was a long process trying to find what I remembered seeing and I wanted to knit. Now presto I can find it. Thank you I love MDK….my favorite place. I have one more request … my orange boxes are just about full.Are you going to have more or can we look forward to a new method of keeping the wonderful Field Guides together.
Thank you for linking all the LEARN features to the patterns. I’ve been bookmarking all the tips and tricks articles and often making not of them in my FG, but often wonder “will I remember to check my bookmarks?” Nice to no longer have to rely on my less than stellar memory anymore.
This is the best feature ever. Whoever thought of this deserves a prize. You have such wonderful tips and tricks, and now I can find them close to wear I need them. Thanks!
Thank you for linking the relevant tutorials with the patterns. It’s always been something that challenged me – to find a helpful tutorial when i’m knitting a tricky pattern, Now I’m encouraged to try something brioche.
What a massive undertaking! This will be incredibly useful for so many reasons. Kudos to MDK.
Gauge seems to be my nemesis. Would love to be able to search by gauge. Wonder if that can be added. Love all the information you provide, along with helpful tips and knit along experience.
Fabulous and nimble features to educate and inspire! Love it!
It took 3 attempts to open the website !
Would you please allow us to purchase more MDK containers for all of our books
Hi, Ann – the slipcases as we knew them won’t be returning, I’m afraid. They were surprisingly easy to damage in shipping, and because of the flat-pack nature of them, kind of expensive to ship as well. We might bring back some Field Guide storage method in the future, though: you never know!
This is so valuable – thank you!!!
This is a huge amount of work! And an incredible bonus for your loyal readers! Thank you 🙂
Wow!!! This is GREAT!!! Thank you!!!!
Love this! I noticed that you did not include the patterns from your earlier books, went looking to see if the books were out of print, and it looks like they might be … the books are not on the Penguin Random House/ Potter Craft website, although you can still find them on Amazon. I’m guessing there’s a copyright issue with including those patterns? Or you just don’t want to include them if they’re now harder to find? I have both your books, so it would be nice to have them included
I have the two hardback books and was thinking the same thing! I’m afraid your work never ends.
Beautiful! I especially love the extra content at the bottom of the page that provides links to useful resources.
This is really amazing! I filtered immediately to sweaters and that reminded me of all the sweaters I wanted to knit and didn’t knit yet. And then I saw all of the related content right there! Wow! So incredibly useful.
Thank you for this fantastic upgrade.
Thank you for making it easier to follow your incredible inspiration and patterns!
Bought that yarn and can’t remember what it was for–boy, you’ve got MY number!
Congratulations! I wish I could buy individual patterns instead of only field guides. Do you have any plans for adding that option to your website?
Just saw this & then went to patterns page for the first time. One thought, I know you want to drive people to events but maybe patterns shouldn’t be the last item on the drop down. Maybe there’s another way to get to the patterns page, but I don’t know what it is. The new site is nifty! Thanks for all of it!
Thanks-this is awesome!
Thank you so much better than flipping through all the guides saying, “I know it was in one of these”. Although it is fun to see the items again.