Elizabeth Zimmermann Knitting--EZ Swatch Hat Progress Report

EZ Aran swatch hat front has big diamond because she's a gem.

Did you ever design a sweater using Elizabeth Zimmermann’s Percentage System? Her knitting system combines your yarn, your favorite sweater’s measurements and your gauge into a sweater that will fit you just right. Before knitting your sweater, you knit a swatch hat as proof your sweater will work as designed. Want to see my swatch hat results? Warning: I chose the most complicated pattern on the planet.

Why? In honor of Elizabeth Zimmermann’s birth 100 years ago.

I’m designing an Aran sweater using patterns with 8, 9, 19, and 10 stitches because she was born August 9, 1910. I chose patterns I feel reflect her “unventive” opinionated style of knitting.

EZ Aran swatch hat back features her monogram.

An Aran sweater has cables in all shapes, sizes and textures.

An arrangement of complicated patterns may not be the wisest choice for a first-time sweater designer. Luckily, I reworked a sweater design before when I turned Wendy Bernard’s Essential Stripe into an alpaca bamboo rib, so maybe I’m not totally crazy.

Here are EZ’s easy steps.

1. Make a swatch with your yarn and needles to find your gauge—the number of stitches you get per inch in stockinette stitch.
2. Measure a favorite sweater of a similar weight to your yarn so you discover how much ease or wiggle room you like best.
3. Combine your gauge, your favorite sweater’s measurements and her percentage system to see how many stitches you need at hem, wrist, chest, neck and so on.

Here’s where an Aran sweater complicates things.

Each of those cables draws in the fabric a different amount. Ten stitches of stockinette might measure two inches across. Those same ten stitches in this or that cable pattern will scrunch those stitches together so they measure less than two inches. How much less? See EZ’s next step.

4. Cast on half the stitches needed for your sweater and knit a swatch hat.

As you knit along, you’ll find your Aran pattern gauge. You’ll see whether your arrangement of cable designs is knitting up too narrow or too wide. You may go up or down a needle size for optimum results.

Or you may discover you have too many designs!

That’s what happened to me. I couldn’t use every design I thought I would use in my sweater front. It would have made a hat for a giant.  My noggin is big, but not a pumpkin.

Perhaps my designs didn’t draw in much? Perhaps my bust and butt are too big in proportion to my head? EZ didn’t figure THAT percentage. I reworked my hat design starting with ribbing that fit my head.

EZ Aran swatch hat with 3 cables on each side.

Did my swatch hat prove my sweater design will work?

Well, I now know the measurements of the designs I used. If I use some other designs in my sweater, there’s still an element of surprise in store for me. Elizabeth Zimmermann would suggest making another swatch hat with the other designs. Hey, I thought up a more elegant decrease anyway.

Best,

Karen

P.S.

Perhaps the EZ monogram on the hat back is too subtle. The OXO cable is hugs and kisses for her. The antler cable reflects her stubborn ways. The triple plait with one textured cable stands for how she did the unexpected.  What designs would you pick in honor of Elizabeth Zimmermann?