Knotting Natural Bags and Belts: 18 Macramé Projects to Accessorize Your Everyday Wardrobe

Malimban, owner of the online macramé store Knotty by Nature, debuts with an easy-to-follow primer on creating macramé bags and belts. She recounts learning macramé to make decorations for her “Camp Boho”–themed wedding, which led her to open an Etsy store for her work. To help readers craft her designs, she offers an overview of necessary supplies, recommending measuring tape, combs to tease out tassels, and corkboard and pushpins to hold projects in place while one works. Malimban prioritizes “repetitive basic knots” in her designs to keep them beginner-friendly and shows how to craft a pink open-weave “net bag” and a fringed white “phone holder bag” mostly made of square knots. A broader variety of knots are used in the belts, which include the “zigzag pattern belt” and the relatively ornate “diamond-pattern belt with wooden rings.” The ample photos illustrating each step make the designs easy to follow, and the tone is fun throughout (“Let’s get knotty!”), even if Malimban sometimes goes overboard with puns (“Make sure you do knot cut the cord off before untying it”). Novices will appreciate these charming, simple projects. (Jan.)