Named after a fun little hornpipe, this hoodie is made to look as if offcuts of a large-flowered fabric had been randomly pieced together. It features a rounded drawstring hood, a knit-in tubular pocket, saddle shoulders and square indented sleeves.

The snappy tailoring of the piece seems to suggest lots of seams, but in fact it doesn’t have any! Instead, stitches are picked up from the edges to allow modular joining as you go. The only hand-stitching happening (simple running stitch) is on the fold-over edge of the hood which houses the drawstring.

The modular construction has the added bonus of allowing for a lot of variety in styling. You can make the side panels and / or sleeves and / or hood in a contrasting colour. You can choose less contrast for the intarsia or leave them out altogether. The garter stitch rows that stand in lieu of seams can be worked in the main colour or a more strongly contrasting one. The i-cord drawstring could be a different colour or stripy, or you could use a cord, a fingerloop braid, a tablet-woven ribbon … Can’t wait to see all your variations, in fact!

The simple snood that comes with the pattern can be made in any colour and worn as extra protection against chill winds.

Skills required: knit, purl, standard incs and decs, pick up stitches, basic intarsia technique, make i-cord (optional), very basic hand-sewing skills (running stitch).
The three-needle bind-off is explained in the pattern, also wrap-and-turn short rows.

You will need:

• Drops Lima: 550 / 600 / 650 / 700 g in Grey-Blue, 50 g each in Pistachio, Purple Mix, Heather, Ruby Red, Sea Green Mix and Ice Blue. If you want to make the snood in any of the intarsia colours, an extra 50 g will do the trick. You can, of course, use other DK yarns, and leftovers are fine for the smaller intarsia. The Size L weighs in at just 690 g.
• 3 circular needles (at least 80 cm long) in the size that will get you the correct tension
• and the usual bits and bobs - scissors, darning needle, waste yarn …

This pattern has a great many pages, but never fear, this is only because it has separate, full charts for the four sizes (which makes them easier to use). You won’t need to print everything!

Have a listen to “Alston Flower Show”, played on the Northumbrian smallpipes, here.