In The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the first of many books L. Frank Baum wrote about Oz, its capital city was called the “City of Emeralds,” not the “Emerald City” (which was used in his later books, and in the 1939 movie). Here’s another piece of Oz trivia: The Wizard required everyone in the city to wear green glasses, not (as he claimed) to protect their eyes from the city’s brilliance, but to maintain the illusion that everything within the city was green; in fact, while the exteriors of the city’s great buildings and its outer wall were encrusted with emeralds, their interiors were of many different colors. That deceitful Wizard!

So the lore of Oz inspired two moods for this hat: City of Emeralds shows the city in jeweled shades of green, silhouetted against a golden sky (a nod to the famed Yellow Brick Road), while the second shows the skyline and sky on a tornado-ey sort of day, as if seen through the Wizard’s green glasses.

The City of Emeralds is a beanie-style hat with some slouch at the crown, and is worked in the round from the bottom up. The number of rounds worked between the City motif and the crown decreases can be adjusted (see instructions) to fine-tune the slouch of your beanie (City of Emeralds is less slouchy, and Wizard’s Green Glasses is more slouchy).

The City motif is worked in mosaic knitting, a slipped stitch technique invented by Barbara Walker for color knitting. It is much easier than stranded knitting, because only one color of yarn is used during each round (the stitches of the other color are slipped). My love of this technique was inspired in part by Woolly Wormhead’s wonderful mosaic knitting, including her Shadowed hat pattern, in the Winter 2019 issue of Knitty.

SIZE
ToddlerChild, Teen-Small Adult, Med-Large Adult
Shown in Size Teen-Small Adult in more slouchy version above(dark green/light green) and Size Med-Large Adult in less slouchy version (blue-green/gold) below.

Fits head circumference of approx 17-1818-20, 20-22, 22-23 inches/ 43-45.545.5--51, 51-56, 56-58.5 cm.

FINISHED MEASUREMENTS
Circumference: 16.7518, 19.25, 20.5 inches/42.545.5, 49, 52 cm
Height:

Less slouchy version: 6.57, 8.25, 8.25 inches/16.518, 21, 21 cm
More slouchy version: 7.58, 9.25, 9.25 inches/ 1920.5, 23.5, 23.5 cm
MATERIALS
Yarn
Madelinetosh Tosh DK 100% superwash merino wool; 225 yd/205 m per 115g skein;

City of Emeralds version (blue-green/gold):
Color A Newshire; 1 skein
Color B Glazed Pecan; 1 skein

The Wizard’s Green Glasses version (dark green/light green):
Color A Tacanda; 1 skein
Color B Venti Dragon Mocha; 1 skein

Yarn Characteristics
Madelinetosh Tosh DK is a DK-weight plied wool yarn that is smooth, springy, and has been hand dyed in lightly to moderately variegated colors, which add interest and depth to the design. Whether using solid or variegated yarn, choose colors that have enough contrast to display the design.