I'm so pleased to introduce you to the best knitting machine! It's the Brother profile 551. It's versatile, easy to maintain, and can help with lots of knitting projects.
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Hi I’m Faith Humphrey Hill, a portrait artist combining knitting and drawing with digital tools. I was a gallery director for 20 years before becoming a full time artist. Follow my journey into knit prints, knit animations and beyond on my website.
www.dartily.com/
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My work provides an optimistic view of technology’s role in shaping our identity and relationships with each other.
The subjects are strangers to me, just as they are to the viewer of the finished work. Being a visual artist, I use my eyes to learn about the person, and in the process find commonalities between us.
Knitting (a form of binary code) is included because of its continuous flow of fibers that mirrors our interconnectedness as people.
These pieces are created using new and old machines. Incorporating technology in the process reflects my life with metal implants; as I am a balance between organic and inorganic so should my art.
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I’m going to share a very special story and part of my art process. My knitting machine, but not just any machine this is the first machine that I had and it was used to create pieces like this.
I got this machine from a gallery I used to work in. The space had been previously been an antique store. One day I was organizing supplies in the basement and there was this pile of antiques that were left over. I was moving them into the corner when I happened upon this mint green metal case. I opened it and given the line of latch hooks I figured it must be related to fiber arts. I looked it up on my phone which revealed it was a knitting machine. I was already a regular hand-knitter at this time so this was very exciting to me. I immediately asked the landlord about the antiques and he apologized stating that he had been meaning to throw them away so they wouldn’t be in our way! I explained that there was an item in the pile that was an art supply and he said to take it. He was just going to trash it anyway. I was thrilled. The machine was so interesting. All the levers and buttons. How could this metal mechanical contraption make soft gentle knit fabric? I played with it from time to time for a few years and during this time I started to incorporate knitting into my artwork. I wanted to expand into creating knit animations. However, creating that many images with the method I was doing by hand would take months. So I sat down for a week and learned about this machine. I learned how to maintain it, how to make a sweater on it, and then how to fiddle with it just so as to create the kind of artwork I had envisioned.
This machine is a Brother Profile 551 and was made in the late 50’s early 60’s. It’s a single-bed machine and all metal. I love this machine and think its a great first machine for several reasons.
It can do so many things. You can make sweaters, socks, lace, colorwork. It’s a very versatile machine.
I often see these available for good prices 2nd hand. I have a duplicate of this machine that only cost $150.
Being all metal these machines ship well. I've seen several machines of different models be shipped 2nd hand. The plastic machines from the 70s and 80’s almost arrived cracked but these machines have always arrived perfectly.
They are simply mechanical. So maintenance is easy. There are no electronic components to update.
Theres few items to replace if they’re missing and those tools are easy to find online.
This machine has the same capabilities as the new Singer Lk150 that you can buy today in stores but that machine is plastic so not as durable and costs between $4-500. Plus it’s not as cute as this one.
The one con is that because it’s a simple machine you’ll have to do more small stitch transfers for more complex designs, unlike the later knitting machine models that have punchcards or electronics that will switch colors and follow patterns more on their own.