"The complex designs can be confusing, but I love how this book makes it simple to follow. The author offers two innovative — and very simple — approaches to designing unique celtic knot designs that make it easy enough for (almost) anyone to create their own." — Daily Greet Whether you're a complete beginner or have already attempted to learn the art of Celtic knotwork, this is the book for you! Artists at all levels will treasure this guide, which not only demonstrates how to duplicate patterns from a rich and varied gallery of examples but also how to take the next step to creating your own unique designs. This newly revised edition of Creating Celtic Knotwork features a wealth of added material and revisions. Author Cari Buziak draws upon her extensive teaching experience to present easy-to-understand, well-illustrated instructions that explain all the basic techniques of Celtic patterns as well as the art's meaning and history. In addition to spirals, mazes, and step patterns, the designs include dragons, hounds, and other animals as well as human forms. Exercises and tips encourage experimentation that will allow you to develop your own variations on traditional forms. Information on drawing tools, painting materials, transferring patterns, and other practical aspects will help you get started right away. Cari Buziak currently lives in Calgary, Alberta, with one cat, one dog, and one beehive. She enjoys crafting, creating costumes, knitting and quilting. In a mix of old techniques (handmade gesso, egg tempera, gold leaf) and new (several Mac computers) she re-creates ancient manuscripts in painted and digital form for a wide variety of merchandising and fine art needs. Cari's current and past published works include book illustrations for Interweave Press, Penguin/Pearson Books, Llewellyn Publications, and Chronicle Books as well as designing Irish dance dresses, jewelry designs, and other commissioned works. Her work has been featured in design magazines, and she has had gallery exhibitions in Calgary, Toronto, Indiana, Florida, Michigan, Wisconsin, Oregon, Japan, London, and New York. Cari's artwork also appears in private collections in Canada, Europe, Japan, and the United States. Creating Celtic Knotwork A Fresh Approach to Traditional Design By Cari Buziak Dover Publications, Inc. Copyright © 2018 Cari Buziak All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-0-486-82033-0 Contents The Basics, xi, Borders & Corners, 29, Crosses, 39, Spirals, 49, Maze & Step Patterns, 59, Zoomorphics, 71, Techniques & Materials, 107, Biography, 113, Dot Paper, 114, Dot Paper: ring style, 115, CHAPTER 1 The Basics Getting Ready ... To create Celtic knots I use a technique that's based on a gridwork of alternating big and small dots. The dots create a pattern that allows you to make new knotwork designs easily and even in shapes other than just rectangles or squares, as you'll see later in this and other chapters. This book includes a few sheets of ready-made "dot paper" for you, but to create your own is easy. Normal graph paper is made up of a series of squares all over the page. You can sometimes purchase it with bigger or smaller squares, depending on the size of knot you want to create. If only one size is available it can be scaled up or down using a photocopier, or made from scratch at any size using a computer. Using different-colored markers or a pen, alternate coloring one big dot, followed by a smaller dot, all across the page of graph paper. Make sure that as you move down to the next row you continue to alternate the dots. If there is a big dot above in the previous row, then below it there should be a small dot, and so on. Once the whole sheet is covered, make a photocopy before using it — that way you won't have to make it again next time. Basic Celtic Knotwork For clarity, in my examples I will display only the big and small dots and not the graph paper lines. To make your first knot, mark off a box anywhere on the sheet, at least 5 big dots and 4 little dots across. Mark the same distance down (5 big and 4 little dots) so you have an even square. For the dot system to work properly, make sure box corners are always on a BIG dot. Each small dot is going to be an intersection where two "ropes" of knots are going to cross over each other. Begin to add a double-lined "X" over the little dots within the marked-off box, with each set of the "X" lines running to either side of the little dot like a tic-tac-toe board tipped on its side. Continue drawing a double-lined "X" over each little dot until reaching the box border. Do not "X" the little dots that lie right on the border line, just those that fall within the border. Your big dots never get crossed over by the knot. Think of the big dots as posts that the knot must bend around to follow its path. You will find that the "X" patterns will meet up on the diagonal, which is correct. If you're making a very large knot, you can