On The Needles: A 1950's Fair Isle Cardigan

After knitting my first stranded colorwork cardigan with steeks, I really wanted to cast on a new colorwork project straight away. After hemming an hawing about what to knit next, I decided that I really wanted to challenge myself and take the next step to multi-colored stranded knitting. I have this lovely 1950's Bestway pattern in my collection for a Fair Isle cardigan which I decided on making - my first real fair isle. As with most of these patterns, the original is knitted flat. Naturally I decided to knit it in the round instead, with steeks for the center front and armholes. Luckily it is a V neck cardigan so I can just continue the center front steek all the way up and I don't have to worry about the neckline shaping. The yarn I am using is Knitpicks Palette, which is a yarn that I have been wanting to try for a while and I really like it for colorwork.

I have just finished the body and cast on for the sleeves. I have decided to knit "siamese sleeves" where you knit the two sleeves as one piece with steeks to separate them. I got this idea from the wonderful Tasha who has knitted this cardigan as well and, as always, documented the process in great detail. I am afraid it will make the sleeve seams rather bulky, but it should make the knitting itself much easier and quicker, plus it uses up less yarn! Now that I know I can do this it has become very addictive and I simply cannot wait to knit ALL the fair isle garments!

I will write an in-depth post about the entire process once it's finished - I thought that might be helpful and interesting to some of you.