I am very excited to be typing from the midst of our Christmas celebrations and to be sitting here for the Big Day in my most recently finished FO. Mark took a few moments out from the basting, roasting, chopping, pouring, simmering and infusing in order to take some photos of me in it; here they are.

I have been making this on and off since Woolfest, where I chanced upon the wondrous Blacker Designs stall and – faced with so many sheeply shades – promptly dreamt up a coat-of-many-colours in natural fleece shades. Herding balls of wool into a carefully graded line of colours, I immediately began to swatch and plot for how they may later be organised into a wearable piece of knitting.

I really wanted this jacket to do two things; firstly I wanted it to showcase the progression through all the shades of grey/brown/cream present among our UK sheep and their natural colours, and secondly I wanted the jacket/cardigan to appear to be a single piece of knitting, seamless and invisibly joined. I suspect this last choice was influenced by the skill of the shearers who I saw at Woolfest, who took each fleece from its owner in a single, unbroken piece.

As well as being seamless, all of one piece and organised according to the natural colours of our UK sheep, I wanted this jacket to also be knit in the most elementary and simple of stitches – garter stitch. The jacket is therefore constructed entirely in this most rudimentary stitch, and I took inspiration from Ysolda’s amazing fingerless mitts and Red Lipstick Designs’ lovely Headigan pattern, in order to shape the whole thing using short-rows, neatly concealed within the bumps of garter-stitch fabric. The whole jacket is thus constructed using garter stitch and short-rows, and pieced together using plenty of neat grafting. I am pleased with its resulting simplicity. I should also add that the Sticks’n’Strings knitters persuaded me that it would work best with an open front, cardigan/jacket-style, and thus prevented me from grafting the front together. I am very pleased about this, as it is definitely better open like this. Thanks guys!

It is the perfect thing for Christmas, especially since it’s still pretty cold here as you can see from all that snow. So I have two questions; firstly, should I write up the pattern for this and secondly, what should I call it? I have no idea what name to give to this jacket and it’s been such an epic, long design process that I really would like to give it a name… all suggestions gratefully received!

Specs:

Pattern design: My own
Yarn: DK in 100% wool from various sheep breeds, all purchased at Blacker Designs apart from the Teeswater that I used on the sleeves, which was purchased from Teeswater Wools
Needles: 5mm
Ravelled: here

I have plenty of Christmas knitting to be blogging about also, and there will be more news of this in coming days. And in other news we have started to drink the cider and there is much to say on this! Finally, thanks for all your comments on the SOUND BANK Advent Calendar; I’ve really enjoyed doing it and it’s renewed my interest in that project no end to find a way of sharing the contents of those little glassine envelopes with you all.

I hope that wherever you are you too are enjoying the warmth of some handknitting, the joy of a full tummy and the company of loved ones. A very merry Christmas to you all! xxx