Every year, I try to knit a sweater for myself for Rhinebeck. If I succeed, I also try to knit sweaters for my son (and now my daughter!). So in the interest of success, I bring you Nephele:
The yarn is Woolfolk Luft, which is a chainette yarn that has a really fluffy single ply inside. It’s almost like roving stuck in a little netting tube. Very odd stuff, but it results in a bulky yarn that is warm without being insanely heavy. It also helps the fabric have a little drape identity, which is super great if you don’t block the everloving beejesus out of it… More on that in a minute.
Nephele has a large, diagonal cable element, which I thought was super pretty. The neckline is a high boatneck, which is different and interesting for my wardrobe. It also looks modern, like something that might be on sale at Madewell or something, which I liked. A lot of bulky sweaters are so massive (and amazing), that they’re totally unwearable here, and they’re completely exhausting to knit due to their size. Nephele’s pattern images looked super pretty, which drew me in right away.
As I was knitting, I was concerned that the sweater was awfully small. I normally like to knit a tunic length, so I kept on going, assuming everything would turn out fine. It always does! Except this time… it really, really didn’t. My initial fitting was so bad, I thought I’d have to frog the whole thing. Luckily, a few of my knitter friends encouraged me to block it out and see if it’d grow before totally giving up on it. The before and after are insane:
The fit was much better, although it happened at the expense of any give/drape in the fabric that would show off how squishy and wonderful the yarn is. It’s a very comfortable little sweater, kind of cute, and will be nice for Houston’s pretty tame winters. I am still not used to wearing such short shirts and sweaters, but I will layer it with a longer tank of some sort. Looking forward to bringing it to New York this fall!
