Gerda is a matching hat-and-mitt set, executed in warming colorwork and dedicated to the loyal Hans Christian Andersen heroine who succeeds in saving her best friend from a lifetime of frozen, heartless cynicism in the palace of The Snow Queen. (Fittingly enough, the name of the Gerda set was suggested by a friend of mine: Homero Luna of Splendor Knitting fame.) I find matching accessories to be enormously satisfying; while a standalone hat or mitten pattern can be lovely, a matching set achieves a synergy that’s greater than the sum of its parts - just like a great friendship.

The Gerda Set features a wealth of loving details, from the rounded edges of the tubular cast-on and bind-off, to the rich texture of the two-color corrugated ribbing, to the mosaic-stitch diamond motif that makes up the body of the three pieces. This same diamond motif provides the framework for both the thumb gussets on the mitts and the crown decreases on the hat, giving the entire set an internal logic all its own.

Gerda is worked in mosaic-stitch colorwork, an interesting alternative to stranded: rather than carrying both colors along and knitting with alternating strands, the knitter carries only one color per round, and slips stitches of the non-working color from the previous rounds in order to form the pattern. All of Gerda’s colorwork is charted, and all integrated shaping explained, in the pattern instructions.

My apologies, but the Gerda pattern will only be available as a set, not as individual hat and mitt patterns. It would be a shame to split up such a well-matched pair, don’t you think?

This pattern is available individually and as part of the Accessories Collection.