Sweater Reverse Engineering

Last night I went on a shopping trip with my friend, Jeanne. A store-that-shall-remain-nameless-but-has-fruit-in-the-title was having a substantial sale (25% off, 30% if you possessed their credit card).

I purchased several things, among them a pair of pants with attached cummerbund, and the sweater below.



The sweater was $130 without the discount, and the fiber content was mostly wool, with about 10% nylon + 16% cashmere, and I think there may have been something else in the mix.

Well! I know this is very possible to replicate, so that is what I intend to do. Of course, at a machine-knit gauge of 9 st/in, I am not going to go all-out and knit it in sock yarn! However, I feel I can capture the spirit of the thing.

So I took photos of it.


And another photo, from the front.


Oh my god, do I actually have a defined waist?! Not really, it's all the jacket (at least from the back view).

I love the overlayed double-breasted style of the jacket. It has a 1" band of 2x2 rib around all the edges, and long ribbed cuffs. The sleeves are a tad puffy up at the shoulder, and are set in. The collar is a long bit of ribbing, too.

I measured the crud out of this sweater! Everything that I thought would be critical, got measured. Sleeve width, rate of decrease (so I measured about halfway down the sleeve, and then at the beginning of the cuff), cuff length, panel dimensions for the back and two half-front panels, button placement and relative distances (especially important because the front panels are not actually rectangular).

For $130, I think I can use a much nicer yarn, and possibly do it in the round. Damn right. The Spirit of EZ is with me, Hallelujah! Praise Saint Cascade and All the Sock Yarns!