Friday Focus: Dendennis

Hello! Friday has arrived once more and thus here is another Friday Focus, sent to you with love from out here in the blogosphere. Today I'm shining a light on up-and-coming designer Dendennis who lives in Amsterdam. He specializes in amigurumi and has some super cute patterns, both complimentary and for sale. Let's hear about his crochet adventures.

Who taught you to crochet? How long have you been doing it?

That's a good one. My mother taught me the basics a long time ago. But in 2012 I decided to pick it up again and used YouTube for the basics. You can find everything there!

Why do you crochet?

It is addictive. The first dolls I made were for my sister-in-law, she was pregnant and my girlfriend asked me to make an amigurumi tooth for her, because she is a dentist. That was my very first original design.

Crochet Favorites

I've learned the most on writing my own designs and how the amigurumis are put together with the book Zoomigurumi from amigurumipatterns.net. I really love every animal in that book and made several of them to really learn crochet. For my animal dolls I like to use Stylecraft Special DK and I like Phildar Coton 3.

What are you working on right now? What is your next project?

At this moment I'm working on developing several new dolls for a special exclusive line. And my next project will be finishing the pattern of my Wreck it Ralph free pattern.

A few finished objects...

I had so much fun working on this doll. A couple of years ago I designed a logo for the company of friends of mine. Although Bill is not as fat as the logo you can see the similarities. 

My own graphic design company is called De Hazen which means The Hares in Dutch. That's why I just had to make a Hare doll. Although everybody thinks it's a bunny it is definitely a hare. He is so sweet with his pointy ears and his big tail. With the use of different colors you can easily customize him.

Also funny to mention is my first Friday of the month event "Bring Your Amigurumi To Work Friday". This event is meant to create a smile at work. Choose your favorite Amigurumi, bring it to work, make a picture and post it on Tumblr or Instagram with the hashtag #BYATWF and see every funny amigurumi in a work environment. If you don't have Instagram or Tumblr, just use another social media tool and share your photos. Yeeeah!

What a fun guy and what awesome patterns! You can tell that he has an eye for detail and shape when you look at his pieces. I am totally in love with the Aang amigurumi. I think Avatar: The Last Airbender is one of the best cartoons ever made, how delightful that Dendennis wrote a pattern based on it. You can find out more about Dendennis and his work on Ravelry, Facebook, Tumblr, and Instagram.