After knitting the vest the first time, I thought it would be pretty easy to convert it to a V-neck. And it was.

4mm for tubular cast-on. 4.5 mm for rest of ribbing and vest. Transition row from ribbing to stockinette. 3.75mm for neck ribbing.

After the first major decreases at armholes, centre stitch saved on a removeable stitch marker, and the two sides of the V were worked simultaneously with two skeins. (Actually, I used the centre pull and the outer of one hank. A little tangly, but it worked.)

Neck decreases one stitch in from edges. 1 dec every RS until shoulder-stitch count matched the back and then knit straight until correct length achieved. Three short-rows used in shoulder shaping for a nice slope.

Picked up 3 out of 4 rows for neck and used centre stitch for double decreasing at the point. 10 rows and bound off.

The colour of this yarn is so beautiful!

I successfully created this vest even though the gauge was different by using Ann Budd’s formula that JoBell666 posted on her Carbeth post. Make what you want with the yarn you love. It works:

First work out your own stitch count PER INCH, on the needles and yarn you want to use, washed and blocked. In my case, it was 4 stitches per inch. (The pattern gauge works out at 3.5 stitches per inch - that half a stitch makes a difference of over 4 inches across the whole sweater).

Whenever you see a stitch count in the pattern, multiply it by YOUR gauge per inch. Then divide that number by the PATTERN gauge per inch to get the right stitch count. So if the given stitch count is 100, I multiply it by my own gauge (100 x 4 = 400). Then I divide that by the pattern gauge (400 divided by 3.5 = 114). Do this each time you see a stitch count. I did it at the beginning and annotated the pattern all the way through.