Tuesday, October 2, 2007

To Seam (Stitch) or Not to Seam Stitch

As I merrily plow ahead with my Tangled Yoke, I thought I'd share one of the changes I made. The instructions, which are for a cardigan (I'm knitting this as a pullover), call for you to knit the entire piece (back and fronts) back and forth with a purl stitch running from the hem to the under arm to give the look of a seam. I did that, but wasn't sure I liked how it looked. So, in order to see if I would like it better without the faux seam, I undid it on one side. Here's what I mean.

First, here is a shot of the side "seam."




To remove it, I first dropped the purl stitch all the way down to the garter rib. (I wasn't going to undo the seam stitch there because it provides a focal point for the decreases.)




Then, using a crochet hook, I laddered the stitch back up -- turning it from a purl stitch to a knit stitch.




Without the seam stitch, the side looks like this:



I liked how that looked better, so before I joined the sleeves and body for the yoke, I undid the seam stitch on the other side as well. Important note: I conducted this experiment before I finished the garter rib on my first sleeve, so I could decide whether or not to add the seam stitch to the sleeve under arm. I wanted the sleeves and body to match, obviously.

I'm almost finished with the whole thing. If not tonight, then tomorrow.

4 comments:

Robin K said...

A wonderful post; thanks for taking the time to do this. I have just started my sweater and thankfully, have not quite finished the garter rib yet. After seeing your post, my decision about the "faux seam" is much easier!

Anonymous said...

I'm anxious to see how it looks as a pullover. I almost decided to do mine as a henley style pullover, so it would still be divided between the cabling, but not below. I only finally decided on the cardigan because of the climate here. I'm sure I'll need to be pulling it on and off so a cardigan is more practical.

CPAKnit said...

Love the color of your yarn.

Ceylan said...

You know, I was thinking of doing the same thing. I'm glad you experimented with this, because I am rikght behind ya :-)