I found myself very distracted at church several Sundays by a friend’s cropped denim jacket. I started sketching on the back of my bulletin, and when I came home I worked up a child’s version of it, though not cropped. My good friend Anne was expecting her first girl, and I wanted to make this for her. I recreated the look of a denim jacket, using the Linen st. on the bottom band & front bands and the cuffs, and a clever placement of a purl column that curves to mimic a seam on a denim jacket. While still being a one-piece Kirigami-style garment, this pattern also features shaped sleeves and shoulders found on more traditional sweaters. The fronts are grafted before working the cuffs; then the sleeves are sewn together.
While the pattern is named for an adorably sweet, little girl, it would also make a great little boy’s jacket.
Kirigami knitting was inspired by the wonderful genius of Elizabeth Zimmerman’s Bog Jacket, which you can find in the book Knitting Around from SchoolhousePress.com. I highly recommend picking up a copy of your own; not just for the patterns, but for the glimpse into her life. Elizabeth Zimmerman was an amazing knitter, teacher, and designer. Reading her newsletters is like having a Master Knitter in your living room. Her conversational style will inspire you to develop your knitterly intuition as it did for me.