Lopes is a short sleeved wrap cardigan AND a skirt with pockets, made in any yarn weight, custom sized to your body.

This dual-function knitted garment is a flaring wrap cardigan with short sleeves that can be turned inside out and closed off to become pockets, when you refasten it around your waist and wear it as a wraparound skirt!

A drapey, loose gauge fabric and a drop-stitch pattern make Lopes very airy - a lightweight cardigan for spring and summer nights, or a sheer skirt which could be worn as a beach coverup, layered over another light-weight skirt or petticoat, or over opaque leggings or thick tights in cooler weather.

It’s written for any gauge (see weight/gauge notes below), sized to your measurements; choose a thin yarn for an extra lightweight item, or a thicker yarn (up to around worsted) in drapey fibers for a slightly heavier piece.

The pockets are indeed fully functional! Well, depending on how big you choose to make them. The bottoms get laced (or drawstring-ed) closed through eyelet holes around the sleeve edges, to close up the pockets. If you make very short sleeves, like the solid green sample, then the pockets will only be a place to put your hands, not for holding anything. If you make them an inch or so longer (about 2 inches long total, from the armpit out - like the sample with blue sleeves), then they are excellent for hands and can hold a little, but not much. For fully functional pockets, you’ll want to make your sleeves a bit longer, another inch or two longer than the blue sleeves.

There’s a video showing how it works, and some different ways to wear it - on leethalknits or here on youtube!

This project requires some math before you start knitting - all basic adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing (very easy with your calculator app). To customize the pattern for your yarn and body, you will make a gauge swatch, and take a few measurements on yourself; then you’ll fill out a worksheet to find all the numbers to plug into the pattern, making it sized just for you, in whatever yarn and gauge you want to use.

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This is part of the leethal Full Body Trio - 3 different patterns for versatile garments. (Each single pattern is $6; the whole trio is $12.)

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The pattern includes a detailed schematic, a diagram showing how to measure yourself, some process photos, photo tutorials for the crochet provisional cast-on and short rows, and notes/photos on how to wear it different ways.

There is a screenshot of the yardage estimate grids in the photos to the left - these are very approximate estimates!

Weight/gauge

Any gauge will work, but fingering to DK (or light worsted) weight is recommended, knit loosely, using needles a few sizes larger than you normally would, or larger than the recommended size on the yarn label.

The short sample (all green) is DK weight on size US 8 (5mm) needles, for a very loose gauge of approx 14 stitches and 23 rows per 4 inches / 10 cm, after blocking.

The long sample (green with blue-ish contrasting sleeves) is the same yarn on size US 7 (4.5mm) needles, for a DK gauge of approx 15 stitches and 24 rows per 4 inches / 10 cm, after blocking.

The loose gauge serves the purpose of making a fabric with extra drape - if you’re using a yarn with especially great drape qualities, then you may not want to knit as loosely. Use your gauge swatch to test out the drape factor and decide what kind of gauge/density makes the best fabric. If your gauge is more normal (not so loose) then you may need significantly more yarn than the grid estimates for you.

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You can preview the first few pages of the PDF here to get a sense of the pattern style and see some of the details, techniques, etc.

This pattern is also available in print format - see my print patterns webpage.