Keep it Classic with the Turtle Dove Cardigan

There’s just something about a basic cardigan that is cozy and classic. It’s great to wear as a top layer when there’s a bit of a chill in the air or to keep handy when it’s colder inside than you would like.

The Turtle Dove Cardigan by Melissa Clulow for Sonder Yarn Co. is said to be inspired by a pullover of the same name (though I can’t find it on the designer’s Ravelry page, so if you have any intel on the pullover version, do let me know and I’ll update). It uses two strands of mohair held together with a smooth wool fingering weight yarn, which gives the whole thing a DK weight.

But because the fuzziness of the mohair needs a little room to breathe, it’s knit on larger needles than you typically would use for a DK weight project, which means it will knit up faster than you expect, too.

It’s worked from the top down, mostly in stockinette stitch, with twisted rib at the collar, cuffs and bands. It does not have buttons but is meant to be worn open with 12-14 inches (30.5-35.5 cm) of positive ease. It has deep raglan shaping for ease of layering and extra comfort, and the collar can stand up flat or fold over a bit if you like that look.

The sleeves are not full length in the pattern as written but it would be easy to adjust that (as well as the full length of the sweater) if you want more coverage. You could also choose a size that provides you with less positive ease if you want a more tailored look.

The pattern is available in nine sizes, with a finished bust measurement ranging from 44.75 to 76.75 inches, or 112 to 192 cm.

The Turtle Dove Cardigan pattern was originally published in Laine magazine and you can now get the pattern free on Ravelry.

[Photo: Sonder Yarn Co.]

Free Pattern – Long Cable Knit Cardigan

Easy Cardigan Knitting Patterns

When I was looking around for free knitting patterns to share recently, I came across this fun leopard print wrap from Yarnspirations.

This fun bulky wrap gives you tons of practice with instarsia and makes a bold statement while keeping you warm. It’s rated for intermediate knitters and the design is charted but pretty easy to follow. And it’s only 50 rows and worked in bulky yarn, so it wouldn’t even take that long to knit. (You can grab the free pattern from Yarnspirations.)

So what’s the problem? The yarn that the pattern calls for has been discontinued, and it’s not a yarn that a substitute for immediately springs to mind.

The original yarn was Patons Alpaca Blend, a single ply bulky yarn that was a combination of acrylic, superwash wool, nylon and alpaca.

My first thought was Lion Brand Hue + Me, which is an acrylic and wool blend, with two plies instead of a single. It looks like it has the colors you would need to make this fun shawl.

But as I was thinking about it, I thought this would be a good opportunity to introduce you to YarnSub if you don’t already know about it. This website is a giant database of yarn that can consider the qualities of the yarn you want to substitute and offer potential substitutions.

It’s not only thinking about yarn weight, like I was, but also fiber content, number of plies, gauge and even the difference in yardage between one ball and another. It even looks at the price and can be filtered by your price range or preferences about fiber content (if, say, you’re sensitive or allergic to wool, for example, or don’t want to you acrylic).

When I plugged in Alpaca Blend, it gave me a lot of different options, though many of them were self-striping or multicolored, which wouldn’t work for this project, and I don’t see a way to filter for solid colors only.

Still, it’s a good tool to give you some ideas you might not know about or might have forgotten about, and it tells you how the new yarn is similar to the old one and how it differs, allowing you to make smarter choices when substituting yarns.

[Photo: Yarnspirations]

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