She LOVES it!!!

originally started 10/17/15
hibernated until re-started May 2017
6/2/17 reluctantly put it on hold again to finish the octopus hat
6/16/17 picked it up again
a total of about 17 days knitting time, but it was birding season so I didn’t knit every day or for a lot of hours on the days I did knit. In other words, a pretty quick knit!

This chart makes for a beautiful and accurate reproduction of the famous Magical Mystery Tour Fair Isle vest. I wish I had chosen a brighter red and a slightly lighter purple (I was determined to work from stash), but otherwise the colors worked out well.

I had forgotten how much I LOVE knitting stranded colorwork in Wollmeise DK!!

Shaping
Since this pattern isn’t a pattern but only a color chart, I made up the shaping as I went along. I took the recipient’s measurements, and I also had her bring me a tank top that fits the way she likes.

I think I made the waist shaping go too quickly--I probably should have done a few more rows after the decreases before jumping into the increases, but I didn’t want it to get too long. Then I increased pretty rapidly for the bust, then decreased again slightly just before the armholes to keep them from gapping.

I used short rows to add little wedges at the top of the shoulders to widen the piece at the neck edge to more closely match the natural slope of the shoulder and thus make the neckband and outer edge lie nice and flat. Wish I had then switched to orange instead of yellow to join the shoulder “seams”.

Reinforcing and cutting the steeks:
I used a sewing machine to reinforce the steeks on this slippery superwash merino, two rows of stitching on each side of the cut. Next time, remember to do the two rows side-by-side, not on top of each other.
I used a piece of printer paper as a backing to keep the yarn from being sucked down into the guts of the sewing machine (a lesson learned from experience with my last steeked DK project). It worked perfectly--and with all the tiny stitches acting as perforations, it tore off easily afterwards.

Covering the steeks:
Usually I just pick up stitches, finish the trim, and either stitch the steek edges down afterward or cover them with hand-stitched ribbon. This time I used Mary Ann Stephens’ beautiful covered steek method. I am delighted with the outcome. I used 1 row of pu&k plus 2 rows of knitting on all the steek covers except the left armhole, where I did an extra row of the orange. This made for fewer bits poking through, but was also slightly too large visually. I worked one less row of ribbing to compensate. I’ve included photos of both armholes for comparison.

After looking at all my FO photos, I realized I couldn’t live with the off-centered-ness of the orange pattern at the bottom of the v-neck, so I embroidered over it (duplicate stitch) with purple, the background color. Looks so much better now! It’s a dark rainy morning and I don’t have time for more photos before handing this over to my friend, but I took one closeup of the vee. It’s the eighth photo from the top.

Thoughts for future Fair Isle vests:

1. For goodness sake, if I make another Fair Isle vest I MUST remember to make the pattern split evenly on either side of the neck steek! I don’t know why I can’t remember that, but next time I must. Really.

2. The tops of the shoulders are important. When picking up stitches to finish around the armhole, make sure to pick up slightly fewer on and around that top shoulder seam. It makes the edge turn smoothly down instead of flipping up.

3. Throw in a few more decreases along the back of the neck while binding off, to pull that top edge in and eliminate any gaping.

4. I like the short steek at the back neck that allows the neckline to dip down in back. (I spied it in a pattern I was reading somewhere and decided to give it a try.) Remember it!

5. Wollmeise does not do its usual lengthwise “growing” when it is worked into stranded colorwork. Don’t count on the stretch when calculating length!