Fitted Cabled Jacket

Here's a detail of a fitted cabled jacket that I finished recently. It's knitted in indigo dyed cotton, which needs to be washed at 60 degrees before you sew it up because it will shrink by 20% vertically! It was a bit messy to knit as the indigo stains your hands and needles, so I worked with an apron on.

The jacket shape was taken from a previous successful pattern and adapted to allow for the shrinkage, which did complicate the maths, but I got there. The waist shaping was done by using smaller needles so as not to spoil the lines of the pattern.

The cable and moss stitch pattern is a traditional one used for guernseys in the fishing village of Robin Hood's Bay on the North Yorkshire coast. I adapted it slightly by using double moss stitch, and crossing the cables on every fourth row instead of the fifth row, as I was knitting back and forth rather than in the round. The rhythm of the knitting fell into place, double moss stitch, 2 rows, cross cables on the fourth. I didn't need to tally 5's and watch the 2 row repeat for the moss stitch. It was easy to see where I was up to.

I'm now knitting the same pattern as a traditional seamless guernsey for my son, more on that soon ...

happy knitting!