I’ve had a good week with my knitting and just this morning I completed the back of the raglan cardigan. I kept on feeling the love for the Rowan Baby Merino Silk yarn but then fell completely overboard when I moved on to the Malabrigo Silky Wool for the yoke. Oh, my goodness, that yarn is fabulous to work with. I didn’t even mind when I got halfway through the yoke and realised it was going to be far too long so had to frog right back to the armhole shaping and try again.

I worked a few rows of garter stitch to transition between the two yarns. I think it’s worked very well and adds a bit of visual interest.

I am loosely basing this cardigan on the Gaudi cardigan by Martin Storey from Rowan’s Vintage DK pattern book. There are, however, significant departures. The Gaudi cardigan has a striped body and an intricate slip-stitch diamond pattern on the yoke. To compensate for the difference in gauge between the two sections, a number of additional stitches are added in the transition from body to yoke. I didn’t need these, but then I had to jiggle the stitch count for the yoke to make sure I cast off an appropriate number of stitches for the raglan shaping.

I have previously knitted the Gaudi cardigan as it was designed and I do like it, but it doesn’t fit particuarly well now (the below photo is from at least three years ago). I personally find the Rowan Felted Tweed DK a bit light-weight and always intended to re-knit the cardigan using a slightly heftier wool and in a larger size. That is still on the cards, but I don’t think it is likely to be one of this year’s projects. The other thing I’m not keen on in the original is how high the neckline is. That’s something I intend to address in the raglan cardigan I’m currently working on.