I know I have said this before, but in the last few years I’ve really become a fan of vests. They take less time to knit than a sweater, and you can wear them for more of the year, as a layer over long sleeves, short sleeves, or even over a sweater.
Trollabackarna by Sanne Bjerregaard is one vest knitting pattern that caught my eye recently.
This colorful, boxy vest calls for four colors of yarn, but it would be easy to use scraps for the colorwork and just change colors whenever you need to.
According to the pattern, Trollabackarna (which is in Sweden) is a place of peace:
Deep in the northeast of Skåne, the hills lie where legends and shadows exist side by side. The name is no coincidence — here, boulders stand like petrified giants, and the winding paths weave between roots and silent trees, as though they are guiding you — if you dare to follow.
The pattern is worked from the bottom up, starting with a twisted rib hem. The body is all two color stranded knitting, with the contrasting color worked in stripes (again, you can use one color or many here) in the round up to the armholes. The tops of the vest are worked flat and joined with a three-needle bind off.
The armholes and neckline are worked in twisted rib and folded over and sewn down to the inside after knitting.
The colorwork is charted, but this is so big and graphic it should be pretty easy for you even if you’re new to colorwork knitting or reading charts.
The pattern is available in seven sizes, meant to fit a chest circumference ranging from 32 to 53.5 inches/82-136 cm. It looks like each size has 3-4 inches/7.5-10 cm of positive ease. It calls for worsted weight yarn and the pattern is available for free in English, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Norwegian and Swedish from Filcolana.
[Photo: Filcolana]
