Some photographs copyright Caro Sheridan 2013 and used with permission. Technical editing by Elizabeth Sullivan.

Afterlight is inspired by one of my very favorite store-bought sweaters, with a few improvements only available to the hand-knitter. The overal shape of the pullover, the neck gathers, tiny rolled edge to the ribbing, and wardrobe-staple simplicity are features I love in my store-bought items. The incredible fabric, perfect shaping, tubular cast-on, and exquisite workmanship are entirely the provenance of hand-knitting. I truly believe that Afterlight represents the best of what we can do in making our own garments.

I highly recommend using Lorna’s Laces Solemate for this sweater. Solemate is a wonderful, soft yarn with high-tech Outlast™ fiber blended in for fantastic wicking properties. It makes a lovely drapey fabric at this gauge, with a nice sheen. If you are substituting yarns, please choose a yarn that makes a fluid fabric at the listed gauge, or the neckline will not hang properly. You want the fabric to be able to scrunch up nicely into those elegant little gathers.

This sweater is constructed in pieces from the bottom up, with set-in sleeves. The neckline is picked up and worked after seaming. The gathers at the point of the V are formed both by aggressive decreasing in the neck shaping and by picking up one neckline stitch through multiple neck edge stitches.

Vertical darts enable easy customization to fit your needs. Should you desire less waist shaping than specified, either omit the shaping rows entirely, or omit/reduce only the shaping on the front of the sweater. Bustier women can work more increases on the front of the sweater, and not in the back. Extra stitches should be decreased into the neckline.

As with all patterns, compare the schematic against your own measurements and make alterations as necessary.

Thanks for your support!

Please Note: If you’d like to use CustomFit to create a custom version of Afterlight, please read all about CustomFit mash-ups and get a worksheet for this sweater.