of the gauge without the interference of the selvage. Without this shaping, the collar will be pulled to the back. The line you measure should be perpendicular to the floor, not at an angle to the middle of the neck (see illustration above). Knitting is about 90% (don't quote me on that %, it's an estimate) math, and that's what Excel is great at, so it's pretty natural, I think, to use them together. Use tab to navigate through the menu items. Because knitting is a matter of individual abilities A raglan can be worked either bottom-up (with decreases to shape the pieces) or top-down (with increases to shape the pieces). Any input would be greatly appreciated. Determine how deep you want the front neck to be - desired front neck depth, This might be a good time to talk about the goal of short rows. Overall, consider how much neck depth the shoulder shaping is contributing, and evaluate how much additional depth neckline shaping adds. The top down version is entirely seamless which makes it very accessible for beginner sweater knitters. UFO to WIP: Can This Crochet or Knitting Project Be Saved? the top. wherever the pattern say stockinette stitch. I enjoy raglan sweater knitting, and I know you will, too. If the pattern already has them distributed in compound shaping, add your new decreases evenly. Its deep back covers any unsightly lumps we may have, and the tailored style is classic. I have fallen for more than a few of your designs but was intimidated because I am considered a new-ish knitter. Improv: Basic pattern for a top-down seamless sweater The body is 20" across, so the depth of the yoke is 10", i.e. Thanks for sharing your knowledge and experience.Jean Ritchey. If you have an odd number of neck stitches, Bottom neck stitches should also be odd, and if you have an even number of neck stitches, bottom neck stitches should be even. The shaping of the sleeve must match . It's knitting a little pocket for a nonexistent neck boob. Those bust darts should extend part way into the sleeves. So I guess the percentages are a bit different on little ones. THE CIRCULAR YOKE Two ways of visualizing the circular-yoke sleeve and body. The defining characteristics of Raglan sweaters is that they have no shoulder seam. Custom Raglan Cardi Knit-Along, Week 3: Adjusting Body Length & Adding Waist Shaping. Tuesday Tip: How to Measure Armhole Depth - Patty Lyons The arm follows the same pattern, although to a less extreme degree. I wouldnt increase all the way to the underarm as that will make your sleeve and body too large. This ones for designers and knitters - lets talk about what makes a raglan click! Wauw - I'm really impressed and glad to find another excel-fan. It's an artifact of the swatch. Im going to walk you through adding a shallow short-row neckline to a raglan thats knit in the round from the bottom up. The waist shaping formula is exactly the same as above. I am narrower at the shoulder and wider in the body and hip area. In raglans worked from the bottom up, the raglan shaping is achieved with decreases. If you work your raglan straight down from the neck, you will have the front of the neck the same height as the back. (Not that I expect special treatment for my giant head children) In a traditional raglan, you start with the neck size you want, increase the body and sleeves every second row or round until you get close to the body stitches you want. Hi, everyone! There's a Pullover or a Hat for the Rebirth KAL! Download Knitting Plus or Easy Seamless Sweaters to Knit! The final stitches are then cast-on across the underarm. half the body-width. Thank you for the information it is very helpful. The casual, sporty look of raglans gives them a somewhat youthful look that has long made them a favorite in knitwear. us newbies. Any ideas for a neat front neck increase? Add a few stitches to your bicep to give yourself some extra room. The compound raglan allows for a more flattering fit because the rate of increase varies to more accurately follow the shape of the body. are cast on to give ease to the shape of the torso. The more complicated a design gets, the more challenging it is to make into a formula, and so many of the designs coming out these days are pretty complicated. If the pattern has you decrease evenly between the bicep and the neck, add your new decreases at the top and bottom. I wanted to make sure it was perfect for you, and I'm grateful for her sharp eye and clear voice. If youve been reading this series, all of this information should sound familiar. Remember - we are avoiding knitting front stitches, and finishing the sleeves and back of the shoulder as normal. The body and sleeves can be worked separately in pieces that are seamed together or the body and sleeves can be worked in the round to the armholes, then joined and worked in a single piece to the neck. Important: Make a test square in the pattern stitch in This gives you 8 increases (or decreases). While it looks like Caelius uses yarnovers as the increases, its actually got a centred decrease with a yarnover, and then the increases are outside this. Knitting on an Airplane and Other Travel Tips for Makers, Why You Shouldn't Buy a Knitter Yarn as a Gift. However you can still get a trim fit with the addition of waist or bust shaping. and markers. Knit the stitch as normal. If you notice a garment has a funnel shape, thats coming from the shaping rate in the raglan (or if working a round yoke, in the yoke chart). It increases more rapidly between the neck and shoulders and at the end to curve around the underarm, [with] more gradual [increasing] in the section in between. This method makes the pattern fit your gauge. the example covers shaping a sleeve, but the formula can be applied to any shaping you want. I am so tired of looking for a pattern that I have in my head with yarn that doesnt seem to match any of their gauges! A knitter who does excel! Add in my Rules 3 and 4 from above, and the problem grows. Half of our bottom neck stitches come before the marker. If a raglan is worked with plenty of positive ease, however, these problems are alleviated. This feature makes it easier to judge the fit and modify accordingly. Knitters in larger sizes will often need to increase every row, and will need to add more body stitches than sleeve stitches. The best feature of this method is that you don't need to change your needle size or yarn to The shaping of the sweater is based on raglan styling from the top down. In a raglan, stitches from the sleeve contribute to neck depth (see illustration below). These workshops are designed to be there every step of the way as you work on your chosen project. Pattern + overview / Part 1: Casting on and marking raglans / Part 2: Raglans and neck shaping / Part 3: Finishing the neck and yoke / Part 4: Separating the sleeves and body / Part 5: The art of sweater shaping / Epilogue: The possibilities are endless. My FO demonstrates the wisdom of her advice (as well as her eye for a stunning cable motif). Cant thank you enough for this detailed explanation and worksheet. The raglan line curves more at top than in the middle on this garment, shown most clearly when I laid an improvised straightedge next to the line. Modern Raglan Sweater Adjustments to Get a Better Fit Karen Templer of Fringe Association notes that when she employs compound shaping, she can use top-down raglan methods to produce a sweater with sleeves akin to saddle shoulder styles. Please consider supporting me by purchasing the 100% ad-free PDF with full charts, schematics, and waist shaping formula for this pattern on my Ravelry or ETSY pages. that which is calculated by this method. Icelandic Yoke Sweater pattern by Elizabeth Zimmermann Hey, I just came across this while making a search on raglan. As pointed out by April K., this percentage method works best for adult proportions. Interested in getting technical content, inspiration, and fit tips delivered directly to your inbox? Once youve worked those rows, place a stitch marker in the middle of the front stitches (if its odd number of stitches, mark the middle stitch with a locking stitch marker). Yes, since you're measuring your body, but that won't have anything to do with the raglan length. The raglan sleeve got its name from Englishman FitzRoy James Henry Somerset, the 1st Baron Raglan, who lost his arm in the Battle of Waterloo. *Membership cannot be purchased with Gift Cards. It is used to suggest a smaller needle size for the ribbing. appropriate to the gauge you enter are needed. My reason for contacting you is just to let you know that the percentages for the Every round neck starts with a flat bottom. Regards, Sarah. This is a diagonal measurement and is more or less useless for predicting your fit because you won't know where it begins or ends in relation to your neck or your underarm. Or consider joining my Patreon for member perks. You save me so much overwhelming hours. A child's proportions Double-point needles or circular needles in the sizes Round to an even number. The front neck can be shaped with short rows or by binding off in the middle and working decreases on either side. For each raglan seam I do one increase before and a different one after it. (This strand is marked in photo #1 with a red line.) Want to go deeper on front neck shaping? As noted above, the shoulder width creates some space for the neck - equal space in the front and back. These little crochet hearts can be stuffed with the love-infused herbs recommended, or your favorite scented herbs, and a rose quartz stone or bead to amplify the sense of love radiating off of this precious gift. The sleeve cap and body can be shaped at different rates or at the same rate; just remember that in most cases, the sleeve and body need to have the same number of rows or rounds between the armhole and the neck. In contrast to yoke depth, which is the total depth of the top part of the sweater, raglan depth is simply the rows you work from the cast-on to the underarm. I just finished a raglan sweater, and Im really enjoying wearing it. NOTE: The photos and methodology described in this post were both updated in August 2016. I would not aim for a highly customized fit in a raglan, but you can certainly get a more body-conscious fit in a raglan than you would a drop-shoulder. Why dont traditional raglans always fit womens figures perfectly, even when designers, crocheters, and knitters have achieved the perfect armhole depth? Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you. Caelius is the sweater in Dovestone Hills that uses this shoulder construction method. The only difference between the two? Any. When I get to the other side of the sleeve do I do it in the same order or do I reverse the way they lean? In a raglan, stitches from the sleeve contribute to neck depth (see illustration below). What about when I get to the next sleeve? I hope that these examples get you started thinking about how much control you have over your raglan knitting projects :), 4607 Library Road Ste 220-206 Lisas List: 10 Reasons Knitting Is Better Than Dating, Spurned Gifts: When Knit & Crochet Gifts Went Wrong. It increases more rapidly between the neck and shoulders and at the end to curve around the underarm, [with] more gradual [increasing] in the section in between. This will be the number of stitches in the last row before any decreases for ribbing. One wonderful thing about raglan sweaters is that due to the method of increasing it is fairly simple to integrate patterns into the yoke and body of the sweater. Step 4: Finesse your shaping - have you used all your rows? Instead of avoiding those patterns, what if you put in some neck shaping of your own? raglans darts button hole placement skirt flares bias knitting gathered sleeves circular yokes If you need to increase (or decrease) a specific number of stitches within a specific number of rows there is a reliable way to calculate this. Being a word person, I got to wondering about the origin of the word raglan, so I did a little research. You will also need to have stitch holders Comments must be approved before showing up. That's why top down raglan are the least customizable of all sweaters. If all of this is still sounding a bit much to take on by yourself, Im always adding patterns to my Teachable Workshops. The raglan sweater style is fun to knit, and I love how the shaping becomes a design element. Yarn overs may be used on a womens garment, or a cable or another decorative feature may be worked along the raglan line to bring more emphasis to the shaping. We use cookies to optimize our website and our service. This is the shoulder width, and from the top of the shoulder, half the width will fall the front and half to the back. 7 sizes; XS-3XL Part One: Getting Started . They look a little different at the top because of the final bind-off, but that difference disappears when you work in the round. It can be US or mm sizes. Raglan Construction A Look at Top-Down Knitting Techniques. For a raglan to fit well, the yoke has to be deep enough for the rise of your shoulder (our shoulders are not flat lines across, but rise from the tip of the shoulder to the inside point of the neck), your armhole, and some wearing ease (usually about 1). In the picture to the left, the top swatch is worked with short rows and the bottom is worked with bind-offs, but the shaping is the exact same. Contains spam, fake content or potential malware, How to Sew Crochet Motifs to Your Clothes, 5 Things That Made Our Yarn-y Hearts Happy at Yarn Fest Loveland 2023, Floral Beaded Jewelry Patterns for Mothers Day, Unique Ways to Have Quality Yarn-Time with Mom. The Cable Pattern For Body: In comparison to a sweater that is knit in small pieces and seamed together the one big piece may feel more cumbersome to work with as it grows into a sweater. For a raglan to fit correctly, you would typically increase/decrease on each side of the body (and at the front and back) and on each side of the sleeve on every right-side row or every other round if working in the round. As an extra special bonus from baa ram ewe, youll also get a discount code for 10% off their Dovestone DK yarn for the same time period. Expect that at some point in the future. Amy Herzog combines compound shaping with a seamed yoke, so that sleeves and body can be shaped independently of each othershe simply eases the pieces together as she seams, no matter how differently they curve. The compound raglan allows for a more flattering fit because the rate of increase varies to more accurately follow the shape of the body. square should be 5 x 5 inches. When you get down to the torso of the sweater it can easily be shaped and fitted any way you like it. Knitting on an Airplane and Other Travel Tips for Makers, Why You Shouldn't Buy a Knitter Yarn as a Gift. Typically patterns suggest a Backwards Loop Cast-On. So, the basic structure of the raglan shaping begins at the neck with increases on the body and sleeves on every round, then it changes to alternating between 1 round of body and sleeve increases and 1 round of shaping on either body OR sleeves (depending on the size), then it changes to working increases on the body and sleeves every other WORK NECK SHAPING ROWS Work back and forth in rows, increasing on both sides of each raglan on every right side row (or as desired) and at front neck as needed for your intended neck shaping (every other row for crewneck or shallow V; every fourth row for deeper V; or as desired). Welcome back to the Sweater Construction series! The Ripening of the Raspberry Cheesecake Capelet. k2tog - knit 2 sts together. All of the shaping is the same, only instead of turning away from stitches, youll bind them off. Neither will cause bunching or will change the shape of the sweater in any way. Hello, thanks for your interesting explanation. Ive spent a lot of time studying it, making a few of my own tweaks and I now have much greater confidence that what Im about to knit is more than just a shot in the dark! I cant wait to try this formula out. You can space your turns as far apart or as close together as you like in the same row, but if you want to create a scoop neck, youll need to bind off instead of working short rows. Because raglan shaping produces such a clear diagonal line on the front and back of the garment, the increases used to add width are often decorative. Jean, I'm so happy to share what I know with others, and I'm glad you think this is useful! To correct this, I write my patterns with two rates of increases. This might be a good time to talk about the goal of short rows. Thanks so much for sharing you work, I really appreciate it!!! You'll want to add no more than about 5/8" right beneath the collar, and if you need to make up extra length you can work some short rows in the middle of the back too. the example covers shaping a sleeve, but the formula can be applied to any shaping you want. Generally I use M1R before and M1L after but reversing it works fine if you keep it consistent. how to improvise a top-down sweater Archives - KT's Slow Closet Thank you so much if you can help! Overall the lack of structure particularly at the shoulders can make for a less durable sweater. Copyright2023Golden Peak Media. are different: I love your site, especially the raglan seamless sweater calculator. Knitting In the Round 3 Ways: DPNs, Two Circulars, or Magic Loop? Thank you soon much for the tutorial. It seems very useful - can't hardly wait to "play" with it.Thanks for sharing!/Lisbethk, Dear Kristen,I have always loved working raglan sweaters from the neck down, but your instructions are so thorough and easy to follow. Now we see why the sweater might poof out just above the breasts or right at the armpit. We change narrow dramatically from the full bust to the mid-chest, more slowly through the mid-chest, and fast again as we approach the neck. ), compound raglans can work better than traditional raglans on all body types; she uses compound shaping for all her raglan sweaters. My 6 year old has a chest measurement of 23 (rounding up) and a head measurement of 21! Any questions? Top Down Raglan Sweater Generator - Ravelry Now compare the raglan sweaters geometry to the bodys geometry. Because the raglan lines draw the eye in from the curves of the bust, theyre quite flattering on curvy womenemphasizing the bust while creating a look of feminine narrowness across the shoulders. Put on a button-down or other non-stretch shirt with a shoulder seam. Post your comments or questions here, or to get questions answered, interact with other knitters and find more free stuff, join my students group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/knittingclasses/If you haven't done so already, I hope you'll like my knitting classes page on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/knittingclasses And before you go any further, obssessed in the quest of a free pattern, sweater, but you need to know something about what you are doing. There are some beautiful raglan sweaters out there that dont have neck shaping. Calculate Increases - Knitting & Crochet Guild If you turned your work at the same stitch over and over, youd create a vertical line, but you couldnt work the next row. I wanted to make sure it was perfect for you, and I'm grateful for her sharp eye and clear voice. Note: I've used inches below. Personally Ive never seen a sweater design that suits everybody and that every crocheter or knitter adores wholeheartedly, without reservations. This size allows you to get a good measurement Multiply neck shaping depth by your row gauge to figure out how many rows youll be working this shaping over. This is the shoulder width, and from the top of the shoulder, half the width will fall the front and half to the back. These diagonal seams are created by regular decreases that gradually taper the yoke from the underarm width to the neck width. I just ordered Your first book. If you have an odd number of stitches, the formula is: While continuing to follow raglan shaping and stitch pattern: Row 1 (RS): Work in pattern to C sts before the marker / marked stitch, turn. sweater neck do not work on children with large heads! So watch out for all the patterns, there will be a new one added every couple of days! That area - the underarm to the neck - is called the yoke. Up until now, these patterns have only been available as part of the book, but over the coming weeks, Ill be releasing the individual patterns one at a time! With the left needle tip, reach down and pick up the left leg of the stitch 2 rows below the stitch on your right needle. A garment with raglan shaping has seam lines (or shaping lines) separating the sleeves, front, and back parts of the garment through the yoke. All Rights Reserved. If you were here I would give you a huge hug! Everything after that is finessing. You start with full raglan increases and then move on to alternating body only rows with full raglan increases so that everything fits right at the bottom of the yoke. I love hearing what you have to say! Even when you adjust armhole depth on a sweater pattern and recalculate the raglan increases or decreases, youre going to see a smooth(ish) diagonal line between body and sleeves. When the raglan increases end early and there are many rows of straight knitting before getting to the point where the stitches are added for the underarm join, I have found that the finished sweater doesnt always lay flat just in the upper chest and back. P.S. The pattern is written as if the pattern stitch is stockinette stitch. 6-7 - somewhere in that range. How to Knit Lifted Increases (They're Almost Invisible!) - Yay For Yarn You can use Kniterator to DIY your own basic top-down raglan sweater, yoke sweater, camisole, or cowl - all in your size and your gauge. That code will be available when you purchase the patterns or digital book. If you are knitting from the top down the raglan seams are all increases, but if you were knitting bottom-up, they would be decreases. In the final analysis, you may never come to love raglans, and thats okay. Bonus tip: Our bust line isnt at the underarm. The final stitches are then cast-on across the underarm. By determining desired stitch and row counts, and then determining the number of increases to make, you arrive at a sweater that fits perfectly. Also the all sizes _inc formula messes up all of my numbers. I add a factor to the chest measurement. I will definitely take a closer look at your spreadsheets. Increases are made around four fixed points. The sleeve cap extends all the way to the neck edge. Womens upper bodies, however, dont necessarily curve in a smooth line: our curves pick up speed and then slow down, so to speak. This action will also remove this member from your connections and send a report to the site admin. That means the formula is: ((Stitches in front neck bottom neck stitches) divided by two) 1 = stitches to shape out on each side. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Its typical to leave a stitch on either side of the raglan shaping. The defining characteristics of Raglan sweaters is that they have no shoulder seam. Pittsburgh, PA USA 15102, Add neck shaping to your raglan with short rows. Or you can choose one of our designs, and get the pattern custom generated for your gauge and measurements. The relatively smooth raglan lines on a sweater have to hang over these spots where curves get steeper and shallower. UFO to WIP: Can This Crochet or Knitting Project Be Saved? The reason for this is so that the pattern can be continued down the body when you no longer need raglan increases. Ready to see what Kniterator can do for you? In this video we learn how to use a formula to easily calculate shaping in knitting. Cecelia. About the type of fit. You can tell a sweater has raglan construction when you see 2 diagonal lines on each side (and on both the front and the back), starting at the inside neck and ending at the underarm. Either print and draw right on, or highlight cells to illustrate your dream shaping. The shaping of the sweater is based on raglan styling from the top down. If you want to join me virtually for a 12-week knitting adventure as we mastergarment fit and modification, then my signature masterclass is waiting for you here. If the front neckline is deep (like a scoop or v-neck), the whole sweater may slide down the back. What I frequently do instead is space the increases out so increase rows are every other row instead which correct both issues I find. Copy the reflected apex to the main sheet and join the dots. To get from raglan depth to yoke depth, you need to add in one-half of the shoulder stitches. As weve already seen, raglan sweaters too employ geometry ruleswhether theyre constructed from the top down or the bottom up, the neck opening is essentially a rectangle that grows at its 4 corners into trapezoids or cones. Focus on Fit: How to Refine Sweater Fit with Compound Raglan Shaping Divide the number of shoulder stitches by the stitches per inch from your gauge. Knit Design TipsHow I design a top-down raglan pullover Half of the shoulder width + raglan depth = yoke depth. #7 How to Knit Raglan Shaping, Knitting For Beginners, Sheila - YouTube If you opt for the top down construction of this style of sweater it can easily be tried on by slipping it off the needle and onto some waste yarn or multiple circular needles. These tutorials and the mention of your Craftsy course have given me more tools and confidence that I may actually make a decent go at making one of these designs! googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('interstitial-ad');}); Save patterns, share updates, and connect with your community. May I ask, when knitting a raglan top down and adding short rows to raise the back neck, do you do these once you are already knitting in the round, or do you do a few back and forth rows? Yoke-shaping is governed by measurement; let us take as an example the sweater given below. Lets dive in and check out why you might want to try knitting a raglan style sweater! Now that weve checked out some of the benefits of this construction method, lets look at some drawbacks. I've made one sweater so far, and have nearly finished the planning stage of my second. Im about to start knitting a top-down raglan sweater in the round with short rows in the back. Sign up here! Maybe a note on the calculator mentioning that it's not designed for kids? adventurous. Those stitches sit right across the top of the neck, and contribute to front and back neck depth. body or the arm length. The bottom up method is generally seamed together but the seaming is actually very simple because each area to be seamed is a straight line rather than the curved line of a traditional set in sleeve. The factors are Snug = 2"; Comfortable = 4"; and Loose = 6". It can be helpful to think of it as turning away from stitches, almost as if we had placed them on waste yarn. of that measurement. 3) Each human body follows or ignores a different set of geometrical principles: no two bodies are the same. We use cookies to optimize our website and our service. To do this neatly, you cast-on the underarm stitches and then join up the back of your body and work on to the other side. Simple Worked-From-The-Top Raglan Pullover Pattern Calculated by the Percentage Method The pattern is generated so that you can use any size knitting needle with any weight yarn. Right after the bust, we decrease dramatically in circumference, then we dont change very much in the mid chest, and then our circumference narrows rapidly from the shoulder to the chest. sts - stitches. Fundamentally, a raglan is a sweater that is shaped between the underarm and the neck with four columns of decreases that go from the front and back of each armhole up to the neck. The needle size does not enter into calculation of the garment pattern. If youve drafted a scoop neck instead, youll need to bind off stitches instead of working short rows. I have downloaded it into my computer and will have it available any time I need it.