Wednesday, September 23, 2009

It sounds better than "Klugman"

In my last post, I mentioned an unanticipated peril of working with cheap yarn. I’d undertaken the original attempt because, after reading the instructions to the Jared Flood’s Quincy pattern in the “Made in Brooklyn” book, I wasn’t entirely sure I understood the construction. Plus, I was honestly a little bit concerned about the name. I mean, seriously, why would you name a hat after Jack Klugman’s intrepid coroner? Honestly, I’m not sure the hat fits the shape of the man’s head.

I thought I’d give the Quincy (a/k/a Klugman) a test run in some especially lousy yarn – get out all the mistakes – and then make one for real. All of this was of course ruined by a bad case of degenerative yarn disorder (or DYD). (http://thestraightmaleknitter.blogspot.com/2009/09/swatching-for-primates.html)

As it turns out, I needn’t have worried about construction. Quincy knits up nicely.

Although I worried a bit about grafting the two ends of the moebius together, and also about picking up the stitches in and around the moebius overlap, it was actually very easy and worked well. The only thing I would change if I made another version in the future is the size needles used for the crown.

The pattern calls for you to use US size 10.5 for the moebius strip and US size 10 double-points for the crown (all assuming you get the appropriate gauge). Candidly, I got a very different feel in my garter stitch between the moebius and the crown. Some of that is related to the needle size. Most of that, however, is probably related to the fact that my double-point knitting tends to be looser (i.e., worse) than when I use circulars (which I prefer and used for the moebius).

Shown below is my Quincy, completed in Rowan Cocoon. Mrs. TSMK has indicated that she approves of the result.


-TSMK

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