Knit a Lacy Duster Perfect for Spring

I have never knit a full length anything, but I have to admit this Silver Spring Duster pattern from Lovely by Lee is definitely tempting.

This full length, lace covered duster is worked from the bottom up in one piece (and I think the sleeves are then worked in rounds from the armholes down). It has a drop shoulder design and straight sleeves. The upper body is worked in stockinette stitch.

The designer calls it “a long, earthy-chic style cardigan” that’s “folksy, whimsical and elegant.” I agree.

The only skills needed for the pattern are knitting flat and in the round, making yarn overs and decreases and picking up stitches. She rates it an intermediate knit.

Notes on the sales page indicate the pattern includes a chart for the lace. The pattern also includes a video tutorial and a link to a blog post that helps explain how to do the edging (which looks like a folded hem but it’s hard to tell what’s going on from the photos).

The pattern includes five sizes to fit a bust range of 28-34 inches (71-86 cm) for the smallest size and 62-68 inches (157.5-173 cm) for the largest. It’s intended to be worn with 2 to 10 inches/5 to 25 cm of positive ease (so for example the smallest size is actually 38 inches/96.5 cm so you can choose the fit you like from there.

This project looks like a lot of fun to knit and maybe not as time consuming as it seems because once you get the lace pattern down it should be smooth knitting. The pattern calls for a worsted weight cotton yarn, which is the only thing about the project that gives me pause because cotton is known to stretch, so you’ll probably want to knit it shorter than you think if you choose a cotton yarn.

You can see some other versions of the project on Ravelry, and buy a copy of the pattern from Lovely by Lee on Etsy.

[Photo: Lovely by Lee]

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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