This elegant little dress is knitted in one piece, top down with no seams. It was designed especially to fit tiny rag dolls made from Ann Wood’s pattern, but it will also fit other similarly sized dolls.

One of the testers knitted some for her 3.5” wooden Hitty doll. The dress fits my Wee Patsy and my 1940s Hollywood Doll. I also tried it on a mini Disney Animator doll and a Strawberry Shortcake. While it fits the latter two dolls in the bodice, I think I will be leaving out rounds to shorten the skirt for them.

Some thoughts on yarns and gauge

Any fingering weight yarn should work just fine to knit this dress. You only need 10-15 yards, so this is a good use for those little balls you’ve probably been collecting. Having said that, fingering yarns seem to vary quite a bit in weight. Here are the yardages of some popular yarns from heavier to lighter.

Knit Picks Palette
50 grams = 231 yards

Red Heart Baby
50 grams = 280 yards

Brown Sheep Nature Spun
50 grams = 310 yards

I listed my gauge, but I wouldn’t worry too much about doing a test square. There are a couple of easy ways to check your gauge when knitting this pattern.

For these tiny dolls, and especially since our dolls most likely are not all exactly the same size, it’s easier to just start and see if it will fit your doll rather than knit a gauge square. Since it’s knitted top down, you can try the dress on your doll as soon as the armholes are in and get a really good idea of how it will fit once you join it in the round at the bottom of the bodice.

Also, I have put in measurements at the end of rounds 3 and 7. If you are aiming for a dress the same size as mine, you might want to go up a needle size if your measurement is much shorter than stated on the pattern. You might also need to add extra rows in length if you are using a thinner yarn.

Most of my test garments were knitted with Knit Picks Palette, one of the thicker fingering yarns. Two of the three dresses in the top photo, the black and blue ones were knitted in this yarn. The green dress in the center was knitted with Nature Spun, a considerably thinner yarn. This dress is considerably smaller in the bodice as well as shorter and narrower in the skirt.

This pattern is free, but if you want to say “thank you”, please create a project page here on Ravelry.