Inspired by those vintage silk kimono robes, I designed this sweater wanting something to throw on over nightgowns, a swimsuit, or to cover my shoulders in the Arkansas summer. It’s lacy, lightweight, and features loose, breathable sleeves. In the photos, I’m wearing the coverup with a lace halter top, which will be coming out soon. ^-^

This simple, open front, drop-sleeve cardigan is worked top down. The top of the back is worked, then stitches are picked up at the shoulders to work the fronts before being joined with the back to work the body of the coverup. The lace is a simple 18 stitch, 8 row repeat. It looks fancy, but is pretty easy to memorize. I did not come up with this lace pattern and don’t want to steal credit for it! It’s a modification of one I found on Knitting Kingdom, and you can find it right here. The chart was made online using Stitch Fiddle.

Notes on adjusting the size:

The sweater itself is only about 33” around, but with the open front it’s designed to fit anywhere from a 32-38” bust. If you would like to adjust the size, I would recommend either knitting looser or tighter, or you can add a lace repeat (18 stitches) or two to the pattern. Please note that changing the amount of stitches you cast on for the back, will affect how many you should pick up to form the fronts. If you’d like to make the armholes either smaller or larger, that’s also possible. Either work a longer or shorter length on the back then make your front pieces the same length before joining them all.

The cardigan is worked top down. If you’re like me, you want to limit the amount of scrap yarn you end up with. I like the top-down method because it allows me to knit until I run out of yarn. To make this work, you’ll want to knit your sleeves before finishing the body of the sweater.

Knit until you run out of yarn or just can’t knit any more. Because of the nature of the lace pattern, it’s okay if you can’t work a full repeat over your last few rows. Just make sure you end on a wrong side row and have enough to work 4 rows of garter stitch and to bind off. I stopped working the lace when I had 7 grams or about 50 yards left.