Square Needles?

Yep, you read that right.  Kollage has come out with square needles.  The sides are squared off to supposedly ease some of the strain on your hands.  In the interest of science, I bought 2 types of their square needles from the Paradise Fibers booth at Sock Summit. 

The first one I tried was the circular needle in a size 7 since I needed a 40" circular to work on the Cinxia sweater.  I’ve resisted writing this review for awhile because I just don’t have words to express how much I hated working with the circular needles.  To be fair, I loved the needle portion.  It really did feel nice in my hands.  I didn’t feel the need to grasp the needle so tightly, as my fingers could just sort of touch the squared off edges and keep the needles in motion.  The part I hated was the cable.  It seemed to stick to the wool/linen blend.  I had to actively tug on the fabric to get the stitches to move along the cable.  I don’t need to fight with my knitting, I just want to enjoy it.  I returned the needle to Paradise Fibers right away.  Paradise Fibers was very gracious about the return, saying that they were getting very mixed reviews of the circulars.  Some people love them, some hate them.  Check me off as the later.  (Bythe way, check out Paradise Fibers, they are a family run company out of Canada.  The family stayed in the same hotel as me and were very nice the entire weekend.  Plus, they donate 2% of each year’s profits to maintaining fiberarts traditions.) 

I also bought size 1 double points.  I’m a pretty tight knitter and socks tend to make my hands ache.  I’m knitting the sock shown above with Socks That Rock and the Kollage needles.  I’m not sure that the needles really ease any strain on my hands.  After a weekend of knitting socks, I could really use a hand and arm massage.  However, the tips are super pointy and great for doing knit 2 togethers.  The metal needle is very strong; even with my tight knitting, I don’t feel like the needle might break off in my hands like I would with bamboo needles.  These needles rank right up with the KnitPicks wooden needles as my favs. 

Overall, I would say that the double points are a winner.  I would definitely buy more double points and probably buy some straight needles from them as well (I don’t use straights all that often, but I’m a sucker for pretty needles and these are beauts).