A holiday gift for my friend to give to her son, who just got in to the college of his dreams! Colorways chosen based on the school colors (note: blue colorway was from older put-up; yardage/grams adjusted accordingly). Hat made a bit loosely on the pattern; mods below:

• PCO 100 sts using gray color on size 4 needle
• Worked until 11.5”, then changed to blue color
• Omitted purl row in pattern for aesthetic preference
• Worked blue on size 5 needle; as a double-thick, woolen knit, wanted one side a tiny bit looser, so that it would breathe a bit more. Not sure that the change made a huge difference, but it still worked/wasn’t noticeably different than the gray.
• Saw that the blue was beginning to flash/pool a couple of inches in. Decided to try and change the pooling by cutting the yarn and starting at a different spot; while it did break up the initial pooling, it very conspicuously caused it to reoccur…just in a different part of the hat!
• For both colors, worked crown by alternating decrease round (K2TOG, K5), end K2TOG with a knit row.
• When each side was 12.25” from the brim to crown, ran tapestry needle through remaining stitches to close.
• Very carefully tacked each side to the other, as the contrast in colors would be very visible on the outside of either color.

Note about photos:
Hat was made to fit an adult male. Model is clearly not either of those things. But she was convenient and free, even if she got a bit cheeky by the end…of about 30 seconds. Also, I am clearly still a terrible photographer; apologies that the photos aren’t the greatest, but the colors are pretty accurate.