The Tailored Sweater - Available for You

Don't you love it when you think something up in your head and the Universe delivers your dream - first class, overnight - to your door? Some time ago I started dreaming about a way to knit a sweater that always fits. See evidence of my obsession from a previous blog entry. The theme continues with all my patterns - Lifestyle hats, Lifestyle socks. I think well-fitting knitted items should emerge from our needles - it should be our lifestyle to knit simply and get exactly what we want. We all-too-often have nothing of the kind due to the "backwards" way most knitted garments are designed - in pieces, from the bottom-up.

Enter the gift from the Universe: Tuulia Salmela. Tuulia is a friend and knit designer from Finland, and a member of my local knit group. One summer meeting I was, once again, talking about finding a way to knit an elegant sweater that was knit top-down so I could try it on and design-as-I go. The following meeting, she brought one such sweater, completely designed and knitted in the span of 2 weeks. A method was born!

Over the next many months Tuulia took the very good idea of Barbara Walker (Knitting from the Top Down) and developed a very well documented and illustrated method to knit a seamless set-in sleeve garment from the top down. She presented a "beta" class to our knit group in the Fall of 2008. After the class, Tuulia and I collaborated and devised a spreadsheet edition of the method that enables you, dear knitter, to simply input the measurements of the finished garment and, *bling* out comes a pattern. Design what you want, knit what you want. Thank you Universe!

And now, the Universe offers the same gift to you:

The Tailored Sweater - Tutorial and Spreadsheet Now Available: $25.00

You don't have to wait - it's available as an electronic download. Note: You'll need Excel (1997-2003 or later versions).

See more photos and info at Tuulia's blog. Many thanks to Tuulia and her willingness to let me push and push and push and push to get this tutorial out.