Vintage Fair Isle Sweater

Awhile back I mentioned a creme blob that I was working on from a pattern in A Stitch in Time. About two weeks ago, that blob became a finished sweater. Here it is.

I used Rown 4 Ply Soft for the cream and RYC Cashsoft 4 Ply for the color work. My LYS didn’t have the 4 Ply Soft in colors I liked but they had the right colors in Cashsoft. I used 3.75 mm needles and 2.75 mm needles. Here’s the closest picture to the true colors:

The pattern took me a little less than two months to finish which I was rather impressed with because it was my first project with fingering weight yarn. The finishing was done surprisingly promptly because I had midterms and apparently seaming is less unpleasant than studying. The sweater even got a button sewn on in a reasonable amount of time! I used a cute navy and white vintage button that I only have one of. It came in a bag of mixed buttons and I had been dying to use it because it’s so cute.

Here’s what the sleeve and back look like. I always force myself to photograph more than just the front of the sweater because it drives me crazy when I can’t get a good idea of what other people’s/magazine’s garments look like from other angles. All creases/wrinkles/funny spots are from sloppy blocking. Oops.

I wore it with my black pencil skirt for these pictures. The sweater pattern is from 1946 so I just dressed with that in mind. I was a little worried that the silhouette wouldn’t work on me. I know I can pull off late 40s, 50s, and early 60s fashion. It’s the slice of time where my body type fits the shape clothing imitated so most of the styles work on me. I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to pull off the drapey top because my chest is so large. Luckily it seems to work on me. I’m going to play around with the sweater and see what else I can wear it with. The challenge is to not look too costumey.

For those of you interested, I knit the third size which has a 42 inch chest for my 40 inch chest. It seems like a good amount of ease to me. I converted the body into the round so I didn’t have side seams. I also eliminated the second row of +’s in the color work because my gauge was off in my fair isle and this corrected the problem.