…a new cardigan. This was not one of my favorite makes, more on that later, and I was glad to finish it up just in time for another round of snow. We don’t seem to be getting the worst of the current nor’easter here (knock wood), but it’s disruptive nonetheless. Why is it the shortest month of the year feels like it drags on forever with such wretched weather?
The pattern is Port Jacket by Ozetta (Hailey Smedley). The yarn suggested (and used) is Lettlopi by Istex, 100% Icelandic wool, 50 g/100 m. I wasn’t expecting softness from Icelandic wool, but this lot seemed really harsh and tended to stick together, making the knitting process not so pleasant. The hand did improve with a nice warm bath and the stitches settled down too. I kind of wondered if the stickiness I noticed in the yarn might have been due to it’s having been sitting around for a bit - could natural oils in the yarn have dried and perhaps hardened a bit? In any case, the moisture and gentle wool wash (Soak brand) gave it a much nicer feel when completed.
As this is a new to me designer, I didn’t want to stray too far from her vision. So, in choosing which size to make I went with my actual bust measurement (40”) which was a size L. The pattern indicated that sizes XS - L had 12 inches of positive ease added. This seemed like more than I would want, but I went ahead and kept to size L. I think I would have been happier with one size down, as the stiffness of the yarn coupled with so much ease is more bulk than I really like. I did veer from the pattern in a couple of things. I have tried to get with the German short row love that a lot of younger designers seem to have, but nope. I’m always willing to learn a new trick for a better result, but I’m fine with my standard wraps (or the YO method used in a lot of Falkenberg makes). I also balked at using the Italian bind off for the main body - there was no way I was going to use a strand of this unplied, slightly kinked, sticky yarn in a length of 150 + inches to do a sewn bind off -I shudder to even think of it! The Italian bind off does look lovely on the sleeve cuffs though. I also chose to use handcrafted buttons instead of the recommended toggles. These were long term (25 years?) residents of my button stash, and they help to elevate the look. I don’t think the artist (Arel) is still making buttons, but they were from The Hands Work, Pecos, New Mexico.
