Afterlight

Description

Afterlight is my kind of sweater: Not too plain, not too overworked, in a lightweight, luscious yarn… …and gray. It’s inspired by one of my very favorite store-bought sweaters, with a few improvements only available to the hand-knitter.

The overall shape of the pullover, the neck gathers, tiny rolled edge to the ribbing, and wardrobe-staple simplicity are features I love in my store-bought items. The incredible fabric, perfect shaping, tubular cast-on, and exquisite workmanship are entirely the provenance of hand-knitting. I truly believe that Afterlight represents the best of what we can do in making our own garments.

I highly recommend using Lorna’s Laces Solemate for this sweater. Solemate is a wonderful, soft yarn with high-tech Outlast™ fiber blended in for fantastic wicking properties. It makes a lovely drapey fabric at this gauge, with a nice sheen. If you are substituting yarns, please choose a yarn that makes a fluid fabric at the listed gauge, or the neckline will not hang properly. You want the fabric to be able to scrunch up nicely into those elegant little gathers.

Sizing

30½ (32, 34½, 36, 38½, 40, 42½, 46½, 50½, 54½)” / 77 (81.5, 87, 91.5, 97, 101.5, 107.5, 117.5, 127.5, 138) cm

Intended to be worn with 1-3” (2.5 – 7.5 cm) ease in the bust (or upper torso).

Gauge

28 sts and 36 rows = 4”/10cm in Stockinette stitch

Materials:

Lorna’s Laces Solemate [55% superwash merino; 30% Outlast™; 15% nylon]: 425 yds/389 m per 100 g hank, shown in color Pewter: 3 (3, 3, 3, 4, 4, 4, 5, 5, 5) hanks or 966 (1058, 1157, 1237, 1357, 1441, 1561, 1708, 1918, 2096) yds/ 884 (968, 1059, 1132, 1242, 1319, 1428, 1564, 1756, 1918) m.

Construction:

Afterlight is worked in pieces from the bottom up, with set-in sleeves. The neckline is picked up and worked after seaming. The gathers at the point of the V are formed both by aggressive decreasing in the neck shaping and by picking up one neckline stitch through multiple neck edge stitches.

Make sure the garment is worked with some positive ease through the bust, so that the neck gathers don’t pull apart.