So, I'm the first to admit that I've done a woeful amount of blogging this year, largely due to my decision to go back to university and do a Masters degree. The workload was horrendous and despite the fact that archaeology is a subject I love, by the end of the course I would have been happy never to see a shovel again. Kind of like how I felt about Shakespeare after studying his plays constantly for two years at A Level.

Luckily, that's all behind me now and I can get back to what I enjoy doing as hobbies, knitting and writing.

On the knitting front I am currently working with Ashley, a fellow knitter from Canada, on an interpretation of Dr Watson's crew-neck sweater from the recent BBC1 series, Sherlock. (See the in-progress photo above). The pattern was arrived at after an afternoon squinting at various screencaps supplied by fans of the show from across the internet.


Having never designed a crew-neck before this has been something of a challenge on the arithmetic front but hopefully it'll come out OK and I can upload a full copy of the notes for the project by the end of the month.

I wanted to make myself an off the shoulder sweater but I couldnt find a design I liked so I improvised one. This is a yoked raglan with hems and side panels in 1x1 rib. The central panel of staggered lace fern leaves is framed by stocking stitch. Waist and bust shaping has been done by decreasing and increasing the number of stocking stitches. The body was knit in the round and the sleeves knit flat then joined at the armholes to form the yoke.

This is a very fitted sweater and the pattern notes should be fine for a 32-34 inch bust. If you want to make a large size you will need to add extra stitches either to the ribbed side panels or the stocking stitch panels. If you add them to the ribbed side panels remember to increase by an even number of stitches to accomodate the 1x1 rib pattern. If you have the skills I have also been told you can add short rows to the bust if you just need more room on top. If you're tall or long waisted extra length can be added either side of the waist or bust increases by knitting extra pattern repeats. Extra length can be added to the sleeves by increasing the number of rows between each increase.

What you'll need:

Yarn: between 900 and 1200 meters of DK weight yarn. I used Stylecraft Life DK in burgundy. The sweater itself only used 3 x 298 meter balls but I had to break into a fourth ball for the seams. :-(
Guage: 22 sts x 32 rows per 10cms
Needles: 1 x 3.75mm, 60cms circular needle for the body. 1 Pair of 3.75mm straight needles for the sleeves.
Extras: Stitch markers. Use different colours to mark the lace panel and the raglan decs, row counter, tapestry needle, scissors, scrap yarn, stitch holder.

You can download the pattern notes by clicking on the thumbnail below.