Pattern Dissection. Example 1 (continued).

This problem is not particular to the design we are discussing. This problem is present in 99.99% of designs for hand knitters.  This is The Problem. 

The Problem.

The front and back of the sweater are planned to be the same width. 

Why is it such a huge problem?

Because people are not air balloons.  An air balloon expands evenly in all directions as the air is blown in. When people get larger in size, it is different.

I prefer to explain with pictures. Let's take a look at woman's silhouette, say, size 34, front and side:

And take a look  at the silhouette of a woman of the same height, but, say, size 42:

Here it is: usually we look at ourselves, at the pictures of the models from the front, sometimes from the back, but we usually don't take a look from the side. But the side look is very important for correct fit of the garment. If a designer doesn't pay attention to the side view of a human body, the fit is going to be badly off.

As people gain weight, the bulk of it goes to the front of the body. The back,  though it gets some additional padding, doesn't accumulate as much as front.

The side seam of a garment is going to go from the center of an armpit and down. But the arm doesn't move away from the back as one gets larger in size, it stays at the same place plus a little padding. All the additional weight we proudly carry in front of us. Let's take a look at the position of the side seam and the position of the line equidistant between the front and back:

The solid red line goes through the center of the armpit; the dashed red line is at the same distance from front and back of the figure. See the difference?

In real life it means that the side seam is not going to stay strictly vertical if we don't make front wider than the back. It is going to be like this: 

Yes, if we divide the necessary fabric evenly between the front and the back, the side seam is going to to start in the armpit, then bend toward the front. And it is going to torque the whole garment. 

It doesn't matter, if you do your sweater in parts and seam it later, or if it's done in the round without seams. If there is no seams, vertical columns of stitches are going to bend and they will torque the whole sweater the same way as if there are seams. No difference. 

The result will be the excess fabric on the back, across the shoulder blades; too little fabric on the front and it's going to pull; the whole thing is going to ride up in front and the neckline will choke you; the hemline is not going to be horizontal.

All these ills are more pronounced in garments made of woven fabric. Knits are much more forgiving. For smaller sizes hand-knit fabric is forgiving enough to be able to divide stitches evenly between front and back. But as we go closer to the size 40" bust, or a slender woman wears a bra with a cup size C or larger, the width for the front and back of a sweater have to be different.

Of course, it presents the problem for a designer. It makes it impossible just to plug in the same numbers for front and back. It requires actually to redesign a whole sweater, and the area of armhole and above armholes presents a challenge. 

The lower part of the armhole itself for a hand-knit sweater might be successfully designed the same for the front and the back. Initial armhole bind-off and shaping decreases up to the vertical part of the armhole we can plan the same. But then there are additional stitches on the front that have to be decreased, since we need to arrive to the same stitch count for the shoulders. How and where to decrease these stitches? 

These extra stitches may be divided and decreased in several places.

• Some of these stitches may be decreased along the vertical part of the armhole. It'll make this part of the armhole  not exactly vertical, but there is no harm in it if these decreases are planned carefully and thoughtfully.  What is not a good idea is to get rid of these stitches all at once, or over a short distance. But if you spread decreases over the whole height of the armhole, it is going to work.
• You can transfer some, not all of these decreases to the neck opening.
• You can plan and design a vertical bust dart. Women will be very grateful.

Yes, it is additional work for a designer, tech editor, test knitter, etc. But since when did we became so afraid of a little of additional work that we are so ready to sacrifice the quality of  the design? It takes one sweater to design and knit to figure out how to do big sizes and develop a template for designer, or for yourself. The you can follow this template. After all, your hand-knit sweater is the most expensive piece of clothes you own, considering the price of yarn and the amount of work involved. Why not to do it well?

Pattern Dissection. Example 1.

This is my first post on pattern dissection, but unfortunately, I believe, not the last one.

Last week my friend asked me for help with a cardigan she is knitting. Something is definitely off with the patter and I decided to take a closer look at it.

The pattern is "Leaf and Picot Cardigan" by Laura Grutzeck, originally published in Interweave Knits, Spring 2011 and now available on-line from Interweave Knits, it's the one on the cover, you can see it here.

The pattern says:

Finished Size 33 (36, 393⁄4, 441⁄2, 463⁄4, 533⁄4)" bust circumference, with 1⁄2"
front edgings meeting in center. Cardigan shown measures 393⁄4", modeled
with about 7" ease.

My questions: 
Why only finished sizes are listed? 
What are supposed actual bust measurements?
Is this cardigan supposed to have 7" ease allowance, or is it just because the sample cardigan was made in size L and the model happened to be size XS?
Why there is such a big gap between the two largest sizes?

My friend started on the largest size given in the pattern, aiming for 7" ease.

My first peeve (one of my pets), is a picot edge -- we are advised to cast on stitches with a provisional cast-on, then knit 5 rows in stockinette, work a turning row, knit 5 rows in stockinette, fold and join the picot edge. Pattern says:

folded hem measures about 1⁄2" high. Change to larger needles.

My comment:  this hem is going to look ugly, it's going to flip outward, despite the fact it was done on smaller needles, or amount of blocking the knitter is going to apply. Picot edge is going to look nice in one case only -- if you are going to whip-stitch folded edge to the inside. It'll look decent if it's about 1 1/2" wide, no less.

Then the knitter is supposed to work even in stitch pattern until it's time to shape armholes.
The pattern says:

Shape armholes: BO 6 (6, 6, 8, 8, 12) sts at beg of next 2
rows—74 (83, 92, 99, 106, 116) sts rem. Dec row: (RS) K1, ssk, work
in patt to last 3 sts, k2tog, k1—2 sts dec’d. Cont in patt, rep Dec row
every RS row 2 (5, 7, 8, 9, 11) more times—68 (71, 76, 81, 86, 92) sts
rem. Work even until armholes measure 7 (71⁄2, 8, 83⁄4, 10, 11)", ending
with a WS row.

Let's consider what we have here. The pattern says:

Gauge 21 sts and 30 rows = 4" in leaf lace patt on larger needles.

which means we have stitch gauge of 5.25 stitches in 1". For the largest size in the pattern the knitter is supposed to decrease 24 stitches total -- 12 to bind off at the beginning and then 12 stitches more to be decreased gradually. Considering the gauge, 24 stitches will give us armhole on the back 4.57" wide. Since the armholes are the same for the front and the back in this pattern we have 4.57+4.57=9.14" wide armhole. WOW! I would say it's a black-hole, not an armhole.

It is going to look bad. Really bad. These armholes are just huge, they are going to gap on front and back, and this is exactly what happened to my friend's sweater. When I visited my friend, she had the back fully done, and started on the front. When I put back of the sweater on her back, I could see immediately, that the fit of the sleeves is going to be unsightly, to say the least.

Let's take a look at the armholes for the smaller sizes:

• Size 33": bind off 6 sts; then decrease 3 more sts. Total 9 sts decreased. That gives us an armhole 1.71" wide, or 3.42" for both front and back. It's a good size.
•  
• Size 36": bind off 6 sts; decrease 6 more sts. Total 12 decreased. That gives us an armhole 2.28" wide; or 4.56" for both front and back. It's OK.
•  
• Size 39 3/4": bind off 6 sts; decrease 8 sts more. Total 14 sts decreased. That gives us an armhole 2.66" wide; or 5.32" for both front and back.  It's OK.
•  
• Size 44 1/2: bind off 8 sts; decrease 8 sts more. Total 16 sts decreased. That gives us an armhole 3.23" wide; or 6.46" for both, front and back. It's getting a little too wide.
•  
• Size 46 3⁄4: bind off 8 sts; decrease 9 sts more. Total 17 sts decreased. That gives us an armhole 3.42" wide; or 6.84" for both front and back. May be a bit too wide, but almost identical to the size 44 1/2 in width and it is absolutely possible to design a sleeve that will fit into it. 
•  
• Size 53 3/4: bind off 12 sts; decrease 12 sts more. We discussed this armhole above.

Why the jump to an armhole that is 4.57 (9.14)" wide. Why? I have no answer to this question. 

The pattern says for the armholes:

Work even until armholes measure 7 (71⁄2, 8, 83⁄4, 10, 11)", ending
with a WS row.

The interval in the armhole depth of about 1/2" to 3/4" between sizes seems reasonable to me. But then we have a jump of 1 1/4" between sizes 44 1/2 and 46 3/4. Why?  Doesn't seem reasonable. And then another 1" jump in the depth of the armhole to 11" for the size 53 3/4. Why it is less than between 44 1/2 and 46 3/4? The distance between 46 3/4 and 53 3/4 is greater  than the distance between 44 1/2 and 46 3/4.  Grading patterns is amusing work, isn't it?

Let's take a look at the sleeve. Here are the numbers for the sleeve cap height: 4.75(5.25, 5.75, 6, 6.75, 7.5)".  The ratio of the height of the sleeve cap to the depth of the armhole is between 68% and 70% for all sizes, which is good. 

My experience is that for a set-in sleeve the ratio of the sleeve height to the armhole depth is best within 75% to 85% range, outside this range the sleeve cap is either too short, or too high for the armhole. But 70% ratio will work most probably. 

There is one more serious issue with this pattern, but it'll be the subject for the next post, most probably later today.

Menagerie of My Pet Peeves. Traditional instructions for armholes and sleeve caps.

First of all – I have to confess.
I do plea guilty of the crime of writing bad instructions.

Because: this is how everybody does it; this is how patterns have always been written; people are used to it; I very rarely use other people’s patterns and I didn’t pay attention; etc.

This is very weak defense, but this is all I have.
Let’s take a look.

In a regular knitting pattern there are two sets of instructions – schematics of the garment and written directions. Schematics usually look like this:

Written directions usually read like this (I give only armhole and sleeve cap shaping):
 
Gauge: 111/2 sts and 18 rows =4" in St st.
 
Shape armholes: BO2 sts at beg of next 4 rows, then BO 1 st at beg of foll 2 rows. Work even until armhole measures 9", ending with a WS row. Shape shoulders. Sleeve: [The suggested length of the underarm seam is 181/2"; 48 sts at the widest part of the sleeve] Shape cap: BO 2 sts at beg of next 4 rows, next BO 1 st at beg of foll 14 rows—26 sts rem. BO 2 sts at beg of next 6 rows, then BO 3 sts at beg of foll 2 rows—8 sts rem. BO all sts.

Looks familiar? I bet, you have seen, have followed or have written very similar directions. I did.

What’s wrong with it? Actually, the very foundation of such direction writing is.
 
Let’s see. First, the knitter is given a suggested gauge for the project. Our knitter will do a gauge swatch and aim for the stitch gauge, and she will not be concerned with the row gauge, especially if she uses yarn different than indicated in the pattern. After all, she has been told number of times that row gauge is of less importance than stitch gauge. This sentiment travels from one knitting book to another; you’ll find it on the Internet, just anywhere. And, in some situations, it is so.
 
Then, the directions for the armhole say:
 
Work even until armhole measures 9", ending with a WS row.
 
Our knitter has no idea how many rows it’ll take her to reach full length of the armhole. She just knits, till she is happy with her armhole. And, most probably, completely disregards the fact that the gauge before blocking and the gauge after blocking might be two different things.
 
Then, as we move on to the sleeve cap, the knitter is given row-by-row instructions. True, there is a suggestion on the pattern schematics how high the designer planned the sleeve cap to be. But our knitter is going to follow written instructions, because otherwise she would have to recalculate the shaping of the sleeve cap and she doesn’t think about it; and she doesn’t want to do it.
 
In short: instructions for the armhole are given in units of measure; instructions for the sleeve cap are given in number of rows.
 
Result: It is impossible to be sure that the perimeter of the armhole and the perimeter of the sleeve cap are going to be the same; armhole that is too big; sleeve cap that doesn’t fit into the armhole; a lot of frustration; bad fit. Seaming nightmare follows.
 
This is how we write the knitting patterns. Tradition is a poor excuse for inferior pattern writing. I think we have to work out a better way.