BT Kids: Cable Spotlight
Posted by Jared Flood on
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. Today we’d like to give you a closer look at some of the cabled designs in BT Kids: Jared’s Spore, Julie’s Bairn, Michele’s Arlo, and Véronik’s Vika. Our design team loves playing with the endless possibilities for cabled shapes and we hope you’ll have a lot of fun knitting these projects. . 
. If you just like to motor away on a satisfying knit with predictable pattern repetitions, try Spore. Jared set out to design a charming, coordinated hat and scarf suitable for an idyllic hike on the moors. He wanted a traditional cable motif with chunky dimensionality for maximum coziness. He worked the scarf first, then planned a matching hat with a quirky shape to add a note of whimsy and personality to the set. The crown shaping is integrated into the cable pattern and the hat is offered in four graded sizes, toddler to adult. The shape is roomy enough that even the larger children’s sizes can easily fit most grownups, too – so choose your size based on a silhouette you like to wear. The Spore scarf is written in a single size, but can be knit to any length. The 49” sample took 2.6 skeins of Shelter, so procuring four skeins would ensure enough yarn to knit a long adult scarf. . 
. Julie Hoover drew her inspiration for Bairn from her own family. Her three boys all loved their special blankets and would leave them lying all over the house, so she imagined a blanket handsome enough to fit into the décor of a stylish home—a kids’ item you wouldn’t need to sweep out of sight before company arrives. She knew cables and twisted stitches in the Bavarian tradition would provide that elegance. Julie saw Bairn as an exercise in balance and restraint, finding just the right measure of twisted and regular cabled stitches and resisting the urge to fill up all the space with cables. The ample reverse stockinette ground effectively draws the eye to the center motif and gives the blanket a modern and visually soothing quality. Julie heightened Bairn’s contemporary feel by eliminating the traditional border in favor of clean I-cord selvedges. . 
. Michele wanted Arlo to be a truly unisex cardigan; the pattern gives instructions for gendered button placement if that matters to you, but the style suits boys and girls alike. She charted cables in X’s and O’s for a sweet touch, but by varying the number of stitches in the cables she achieved an organic and more sophisticated look. Arlo has stockinette panels along the sides to allow the knitter to adjust the width of the sweater as needed. This is also a great knit for fast-growing youngsters because the ribbed cuffs can easily be folded up for the first year and then down for the second. . 
. Vika lets a traditional Aran-style cable take center stage against a ground of textured stitches. On small garments, a single bold cable fills a lot of space—Vika looks intricate, but the knitting is simpler than it appears. And while many knitters prefer to work in the round to avoid seaming, there’s an advantage to flat pieces for cable work: you’re far less likely to cross your stitches a row too early or a row too late! Check out some of the beautiful Vikas already finished on Ravelry:
And don’t miss kioto888’s handsome orange Arlo:
We can’t wait to see more of your interpretations of these garments!
. Today we’d like to give you a closer look at some of the cabled designs in BT Kids: Jared’s Spore, Julie’s Bairn, Michele’s Arlo, and Véronik’s Vika. Our design team loves playing with the endless possibilities for cabled shapes and we hope you’ll have a lot of fun knitting these projects. . . If you just like to motor away on a satisfying knit with predictable pattern repetitions, try Spore. Jared set out to design a charming, coordinated hat and scarf suitable for an idyllic hike on the moors. He wanted a traditional cable motif with chunky dimensionality for maximum coziness. He worked the scarf first, then planned a matching hat with a quirky shape to add a note of whimsy and personality to the set. The crown shaping is integrated into the cable pattern and the hat is offered in four graded sizes, toddler to adult. The shape is roomy enough that even the larger children’s sizes can easily fit most grownups, too – so choose your size based on a silhouette you like to wear. The Spore scarf is written in a single size, but can be knit to any length. The 49” sample took 2.6 skeins of Shelter, so procuring four skeins would ensure enough yarn to knit a long adult scarf. . . Julie Hoover drew her inspiration for Bairn from her own family. Her three boys all loved their special blankets and would leave them lying all over the house, so she imagined a blanket handsome enough to fit into the décor of a stylish home—a kids’ item you wouldn’t need to sweep out of sight before company arrives. She knew cables and twisted stitches in the Bavarian tradition would provide that elegance. Julie saw Bairn as an exercise in balance and restraint, finding just the right measure of twisted and regular cabled stitches and resisting the urge to fill up all the space with cables. The ample reverse stockinette ground effectively draws the eye to the center motif and gives the blanket a modern and visually soothing quality. Julie heightened Bairn’s contemporary feel by eliminating the traditional border in favor of clean I-cord selvedges. . . Michele wanted Arlo to be a truly unisex cardigan; the pattern gives instructions for gendered button placement if that matters to you, but the style suits boys and girls alike. She charted cables in X’s and O’s for a sweet touch, but by varying the number of stitches in the cables she achieved an organic and more sophisticated look. Arlo has stockinette panels along the sides to allow the knitter to adjust the width of the sweater as needed. This is also a great knit for fast-growing youngsters because the ribbed cuffs can easily be folded up for the first year and then down for the second. . . Vika lets a traditional Aran-style cable take center stage against a ground of textured stitches. On small garments, a single bold cable fills a lot of space—Vika looks intricate, but the knitting is simpler than it appears. And while many knitters prefer to work in the round to avoid seaming, there’s an advantage to flat pieces for cable work: you’re far less likely to cross your stitches a row too early or a row too late! Check out some of the beautiful Vikas already finished on Ravelry:
And don’t miss kioto888’s handsome orange Arlo:
We can’t wait to see more of your interpretations of these garments!
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1 comment
These sweaters are so beautiful!
Lindsay on