Cable and Cowl Pullover

February 2011

This pretty pretty yarn has had quite an innings. First it was Francis Revisited and then it was recycled into a Textured Tunic but neither of those felt quite right, fit-wise, and so it lives again as Matthew Gnagy's Cable and Cowl Pullover (which was available as free ravelry download at the time).

The original version of this sweater is worked from the bottom up, flat with shorter sleeves which are made seamlessly by casting on and then casting off extra stitches at the armholes. They are decorated with the same cables as the body and - after a hole has been made for the neckline - carried on straight up and over the back so that they can be folded over at the shoulder.

This is a rough guide to what I did, with profuse apologies if my maths doesn't quite work out. I did a really bad job of making notes this time.

My version has full length set-in sleeves in the same Irish Moss Stitch which frames the cabled section in the body of the sweater. I find cowl-necked sweaters so warm to wear that I thought it would be more practical like that.

I worked the body from the bottom up in the round (which meant messing about with the written instructions for the cabled sections a bit on the even rows so that all the purl stitches were knitted and vice versa, but that was easily done). I added waist shaping by decreasing 4 stitches every fifth round three times and then increasing again around where I thought my waist would be.

When I got to about 14.5" long I split the front and back onto separate circular needles and (starting with the back because I was fudging it) worked back and forth to make armholes for set in sleeves by casting off two stitches at the beginning of the next two rows and then decreasing one stitch at the beginning of the next six rows.

I then worked even back and forth until the total length of the sweater was about 20" before making the neckline by casting off the centre 22 or so stitches and - taking each side separately - working a few more rows with decreases on the neckline side until there were about 5 stitches left for the shoulder seams (which were eventually sewn together). Following the cowl instructions as written worked out fine.

The sleeves were also worked in the round on DPNs starting with 18 rows of 2x2 ribbing over 48 stitches with decreases every sixth row and then after switching to larger needles and Irish Moss I worked a further 82 rows increasing 2 stitches evenly every tenth row or so to 56 stitches (about 18.5" long).

To mirror the armhole shaping, I made the sleeve cap by casting off two at the start of rows 101 and 102 and then decreased one stitch at each end of rows 103 through 109. I worked the rest of the sleeve cap by decreasing at each end of every other row until there were about 8 stitches left.

Pattern: Cable and Cowl Pullover by Matthew Gnagy

Yarn: Sirdar Peru Naturals

Amount: 8.5 skeins

Colourway: Machu Picchu

Needles: 5.00mm and 5.50mm

Size: Small

On ravelry: here