I love a top down knitted garment. There is something about how it just appears from a circle of stitches and gives such a neat finish. I designed it to use a skein of beautiful hand-dyed yarn from Siobhan’s Crafts which I bought at the yarn show, Stitch Fest in Totnes, a few years. It has sat waiting for the perfect project but that never came. I decided to team it up with some Sirdar Country Classic 4ply (which comes in some lovely plain colours) and go for a stripe.

The pattern is designed to just keep going in stripes until you run out of your skein, having kept a bit back for the sleeves, but it is entirely how you want to use that skein. The shaping is made with short rows with the raglan sleeve increasing from the neckline outwards before dividing up the sleeves and body. The sleeves then sit around an inch above the elbow. A simple repeat pattern runs down either side of the body and is then incorporated into the bottom hem. It is worn with a positive ease of 5 cm / 2 inches, at the bust, the image shows size 6.

Difficulty
Knitted from the top down short rows with wrap and turns are used to shape the back of the neck with garter stitch worked in the round. Stitches are increased by making one left and right. The sleeves are then placed on yarn holders whilst the body is knitted in the round following a pattern in knit and purl stitches between markers.

Yarn and Notions
Yarn A is the 100g skein of 400m / 437 yards, if you are doing a larger size the colour will not go as far so you may choose to add another colour skein, likewise for a smaller size it will go further. The image shown is size 6.

Yarn B is the plain colour to go with this. Look at the ball band of the yarn and it will tell you how many meters / yards it has.

finished bust size:

cm: 88 (89.5, 94.5, 101, 104)(110.5, 117, 125, 137.5)

inches: 35.25 (35.75, 37.75, 40.25, 41.5)(44.25, 46.75, 50, 55)

meters: 425 (460, 500, 600, 630)(700, 795, 890, 1040)

yards: 274 (295, 555, 660, 695)(770, 875, 985, 1135)

Needles:

2.75mm (US 2) small circular or double pointed needles (DPN’s) (for neck)
3mm (US 2 ½) circular needle 80cm long
3mm (US 2 ½) DPN’s for sleeve or utilise the magic loop method with the circulars

Stitch holder or spare yarn to hold sleeve stitches.
Eight moveable stitch markers, tapestry needle.