Seastago is the Gaelic name for Port Hood, Cape Breton on the east coast of Canada, which is the place my father’s family settled when they were forced from their croft in Scotland at the end of the Highland Clearances. At the time my forefather landed, the region was under French rule, and they called the settlement “Justaucorps”, the name for a vest-like garment they wore next to the skin. The Gaelic attempt at pronouncing this became Seastago (shess-ta-go). When the English came along, they mispronounced the Gaelic, and called it Chestico, a name that’s still in use in the area including the county museum.

A “sett” is the arrangement of colours and lines in a tartan pattern. The look of a sett is achieved here with horizontal colour changes and vertical textures.

Seastago Cowl uses four colours of a double-knit (DK) weight yarn. I chose blue, black and green to be prominent because they feature in the the tartans said to represent my ancestors’ families as well as that of Nova Scotia. Tartan setts “belonging” to certain family names is, historically speaking, a relatively recent affair. Feel free to use a combination of colours that has significance for you, or just make something pleasing with some leftovers you have on hand. Because this pattern combines light and dark colours, do take time to test your yarns for colourfastness before you begin.

Yardages used are as follows:
MC 325 y/300 m (Charcoal, 2 skeins)
CC1 165 y/150 m (Pistachio, 1 skein)
CC2 30 y/27 m (Snowfall, 1 skein)
CC3 30 y/27 m (Oceanside, 1 skein)

Seastago Cowl is worked by provisionally casting on enough stitches for the desired width, and then working the pattern in the given stripe sequence to the desired length. The provisional cast-on stitches are then made live, and the beginning and ending stitches are joined using the three needle bind-off. An I-cord edge is then worked on stitches picked up along the side edges.

The pattern set-up calls for a comically large number of stitch markers (4 of one colour or type, 12 of a different colour or type) and that may relieve you from counting stitches. Once the pattern is established and the columns of stitches become apparent, you may find you don’t need all of the markers. The main part of the pattern uses only knit, purl and slipped stitches.

If a custom-sized cowl is desired, each additional repeat adds 20 in/50 cm in length, and will use an additional 50% more yarn of each colour as given above. A single repeat of the pattern would use half the yardages given above and would make a close-fitting neckwarmer with a 20 in/50 cm diameter.

If you have two full skeins of the MC and one full skein of each of the CCs, you will have sufficient yarn for this cowl as written and the Seastago Hat. Add both to your cart and receive a 30% discount automatically!