Rhombing Around

Looking back at my projects I'm fast becoming a Rililist. I enjoy immensely and appreciate all her small details, technics and style. If I'm looking for some inspiration, La Maison Rililie's ravelry page is my address.
You've surely notice the dominance of cardigans in my wardrobe but this time I fell for a Jumper. Rhombing around just ticked all my fancies. An interesting texture for the main body and cuffs in a lovely 'seer sucker' stitch pattern that create multi little rhombus(es) hence the naming I guess. An interesting construction when you begin at the top, and I'm all for unusual constructions.
Color combination choice is fun and even more satisfactory when all is knitted from stash. And oh did I do well restashing- double fingering held together for body and kidsilk haze added to sleeves for extra luxury and fuzz.
I admire her collar cast off - so clever. And look at the cuffs, see how the seer sucker stitch pattern complement the body and completes the jumper. That is good designing.

 

Ok, firstly it took sometime to come up with the colour scheme. The decision to use white, yellow pink and grey together came from a recent trip to My John Lewis store. I have a weakness for scarfs and I totally loved this Ted Baker little number (colours on photo are too intense). Had to splurge and buy it.

 

 

Next stage was stash diving. A year ago in a weak moment I ordered 4 skeins of Cashmere merino fingering yarn from 'Skein' in Australia in Sterling (soft grey) and got painfully stung by tax and post office charges. Never again she says.. I knitted those double which created a lovely soft textured fabric. The white colour is Madelinetosh pashmina 'silver fox' plus some Rowan kid silk haze in cream. I introduced a bit  yellow on the top arm's fair isle- uncommon thread in 'London stock' a pale yellow that I enhanced with some 'Skein Queen' alpaca lace in zingy yellow. The peach pink is an amazing skein, BFL silk DK I bought in Brighton Unwind from the Walk collection stand. I think it is called strawberry cheesecake -A stunning mix of pinks and golden oranges. 

 

 

 

 

I had a setback with the sleeves, totally my fault. Looking at the knitted sample of the pattern pages I felt the armholes were too tight for wearing a light shirt underneath so increased the armhole depth and went one size up the sleeves. I was happy with the depth but not with the sleeve which looked too baggy on me. A third sleeve was knitted as you do..

Another mod to this jumper is connected to its shape. It is an A line jumper so I was careful and increase only once down the body. Its roomy but not too baggy on my tummy.

Success !

 

BlueSand !

I was just on Ravelry  to catalogue my overdue BlueSand and noticed there are currently 554 projects logged- this is one popular buttonless cardigan by the designer La Maison Rililie which fast becoming one of my favourites. Have a look at her other designs and her blog.

I've used stash wool in sport and DK weights rather than cotton option and I went for soft and light summer colors . The main color in cream is one of the nicest alpaca yarns out there-blue sky alpaca melange in almond shade. The grey stripes which look a bit light blue is Rowan alpaca dk and the yellow mustard stripes were knitted with a shinier sport yarn,- the blue sky alpacas, alpaca silk color 132.  I went down needle sizes to achieve a sturdy fabric- there is a large percentage of alpaca fiber and I found out I prefer it dense.

I loved knitting it , there is a lot of mindless stockinette with the anticipation of color change. Beautiful little details such as those almost hidden pocket background stripes,
Icord edges on hems, bands and pockets, textured stitch on botton hem and part of the sleeves, short rows which nicely shape the bottom curve and so on. The pattern is well written with lots of photo examples and usefull links.

 

My only main mod is to make the length shorter otherwise this cardi would have grazed my knees ;-)I've started short row shaping immediately after the last grey stripe.


So here I am on a somewhat wet Saturday morning in my village, wearing my super comfy, easy going stripey piece. Have a beautiful Day ! x