silver lining

Do you remember my Nantucket Jacket? The one I started in 2006? It's finally finished.

(As always, click to Flickr-ize and embiggen.)

It fits exactly as I intended. However, it does not fit right, which is why there are no photos of it on me.

Bear with me while I explain ...
This is the cover sweater from the Fall 2006 Interweave Knits. I loved the pattern, but I knew I wanted to make some modifications.

1. I wanted long sleeves. It's an aran weight jacket, after all.
2. I changed the triangular gussets. In the larger sizes, the gussets don't make those nice triangles with a column of lace above. Instead, they decrease into large panels of seed stitch (see this example on Ravelry or on Flickr). But, I was drawn to the pattern because of the gusset/lace column detail. So, I knit the smaller size gusset but added additional cables to make up the width.
   
3. I then had to change the armhole shaping because of this. I'm a little fuzzy now on what I exactly did, although I have detailed notes in a notebook somewhere.
   
4. I made it a little longer than the pattern called for ... I'm not particularly tall, but I wanted it to cover the waistband of my pants so that I could wear it to work.
   
5. I grafted the seed stitch collar rather than three-needle bind off. I thought it would look more finished that way.
   

I swatched and calculated and worked out the maths to figure out exactly what size I wanted to make, and how to get that size. And, I got exactly what I calculated for. (Come on, did you expect anything less? I was on the math team in high school, for chrissake.)

But, I failed to take several things into account.

1. The fit of the garment. I thought that an aran weight jacket (i.e. that I could layer over other shirts) should have about 3-4" of ease. With 20-20 hindsight, I realize that the model is probably wearing a sweater with little or no ease, or perhaps even negative ease. (Side note: I wish that Knitting Daily would post one of its fit galleries for all of IK's sweaters! So useful to see how the same size sweater looks at different ranges of ease.)
2. The cabling details of the sweater. There are purl stitch columns between all of the cable details, which makes the overall design act a little like a ribbed fabric. I don't think I stretched it enough while measuring gauge. So, the edge of the armhole is about an inch or two down my arm instead of where it should be. And the whole sweater is wider than I planned. It's just a smidge big when it is laying flat to block, but it grows a lot when I put it on due to #3, below.
   
3. The sproing factor of the yarn -- Berroco Pure Merino. This is some seriously bouncy, springy, stretchy yarn. If typical wool yarn has the bounce of a tennis ball, this stuff acts like one of those crazy super bouncy balls that we played with as kids. You would think that this makes for a good garment -- and it does -- but it also means that the yarn stretches easily. It bounces back, but acts like a slinky -- stretches and springs back, stretches and springs back. Not quite what I expected.
   
4. Most importantly, I didn't think enough about how this design would look on my body. As Maryse and the Mafia and I discussed recently, I'm an apple. My waist is almost as large as my hips are. Because of the gussets, this jacket flares out along the bottom. So, on me, there is extra fabric at the bottom and it just hangs there. It almost looks ruffled. NOT the look I was going for! Waist shaping = good, but ruffles = bad.

But, every cloud has a silver lining, right? My mother-in-law -- the one who taught me to knit! whose LYS is Webs! -- tried it on. It looks like it was made for her!! I'll try to get a photo later -- she was sick when she was at our house last, so I couldn't inflict a photo shoot upon her at the time.

I'm going to give her the sweater. In return, she offered to buy me a sweater worth of a comparable quality yarn. Sounds like a good trade to me! And it works nicely with my Knit From the Stash 2008 rules!

But, before I give her the sweater, I might enter it in some fairs. It think it's one of my best pieces of work. I paid a lot of attention to the seaming and finishing. I crocheted that damn edging no less than 4 times before I liked how it looked. I also learned how to graft seed stitch for the collar. I found just the right buttons, and I very carefully wove in all the ends. Superwash wool + large sweater with large collar + 92 yard skeins = lots of ends!

While the sweater isn't what I hoped for, I learned a lot from the experience. I'm glad that it will go to someone who will love it.