Monday, September 30, 2013

What is Amigurumi?

Most of what I crochet can be classified as amigurumi. As not everyone is familiar with the amigurimu style, I thought it would be a good idea to start this blog by answering the question - what is amigurumi?

The craft of making amigurumi came from Japan. The word amigurumi is a combination of the Japanese word ami meaning knitting or crochet and nuigurumi which means a "stuffed doll" (thanks wikipedia!). It's pronounced "ah-mee-goo-roo-mee". 

While the literal meaning is fairly broad, amigurumi tend to be animals or objects with anthropomorphic features. Typical amigurumi style is usually cartoonish and cute; animals have big eyes and disproportionately large heads and inanimate objects have happy, smiling faces. 

Amigurumi is most closely associated with crochet, but they can be knitted too. There are no real rules about what kind of crochet/knitted toy can be considered amigurumi, it's all about creating something that is cute and fun.

Here are some examples of amigurumi I have made in the past:










These patterns come from a range of different designers - some are free patterns :-) Click below the pictures for a link to the pattern page. The cat pattern is my own modification of the Spring Bunnies pattern (the blue bunny). 

Each design shows the amigurumi style in its own way and this is only a very small sample of the possibilities! Simply type "amigurumi" into Google to see the vast range of cute designs out there. 




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