Afterthoughts

FibraNatura’s Unity yarn is discontinued and currently on closeout prices everywhere (I bought mine for $4/skein from premieryarns.com). It is an interesting blend of wool, cotton, linen, and bamboo that I thought might work for my first attempt at a t-shirt. The yarn is quite thick-and-thin, changing often from a worsted to a light DK, which gives the resulting fabric some hempy texture.

Charles Voth has a review of this yarn at KnitMuch:
https://knitmuch.com/unraveling-unity-and-unity-beyond-wh...

I decided to try out the seamless set-in sleeve design from phrancko.com. I chose the round neck option. The body is just stockinette, and then I did i-cord bindoff in a different color for the cuffs.

What I like:

• It fits! The Phrancko set-in sleeves work!
• Love the orange “Cognac” color
• The yarn has enough wool in it that it is stretchy and bouncy unlike pure linen or cotton

What I don’t like:

• Lots of tension issues wherever there are picked-up stitches (and the in the sleeve increases)… only some of that I can blame on the thick-and-thin nature of the yarn.
• I was hoping to be able to wear it as a base-layer T-shirt, but it is much too scratchy for that, so I’ll have to wear it over an undershirt. In that case I wish I had gone for the henley neck instead of the round neck.
• Yarn not machine washable
• The knit-on patch pocket edges did not turn out as neat as I wanted (and and try doing the pocket several different ways). Probably knitting a patch and sewing it on would have been cleaner.

Construction notes

Small swatch
US 6:
Dry: 11x14.5 in 2” = 22x29 in 4” = 5.5x7.25/inch
Washed: 5.5 sts/inch

US 7:
Dry: 10x14 in 2” = 20x28 in 4” = 5x7/inch
Washed: 4.75 sts/inch

I went with the US6 (22x29 sts in 4 inches). My target is for the garment to be 40” at the chest which gives me about 2” of positive ease.

Shoulders

Follow phrancko pattern.

Body

Before dividing for the sleeves I decided to soak and block to see how it was going to fit. Gauge was spot on, so continued to the body in stockinette without changing anything! I joined new skeins with Russian join.

Hem: us5 needles: p1 p2tog every 20th, purl 1 row, knit 2 rows, purl 3 rows, knit 3 rows, i-cord bindoff in adobe color.

Sleeves

Picked up and knit according to phrancko pattern until they were about 5” long from the underarm (37 rows). Then switched to US5 needles and: purl 2 rows, knit 2 rows, i-cord bindoff with adobe color.

Neckline

For the neck I didn’t do i-cord bindoff to keep it less bulky.

With US5 needles and adobe yarn: pickup and knit around, knit 1 row, purl 2 rows, bind off in pattern.

Pocket

I liked the pocket on a Purl SoHo pattern I saw, so I decided to try knitting on a patch pocket.

With US5 needles and Cognac yarn pick up about 3.5” of stitches (23 sts) for the bottom, knit across until 1 st left/

Row 1 (WS): slip last stitch to right needle, pick up next stitch in last column, put both stitches back on left needle, ssk. Turn work

Row 2 (RS): slip first stitch purlwise, purl across until 1 st left. Slip stitch to left needle. Pick stitch two stitches above current stitch in last column, slip both stitches back to right needle, p2tog. Turn work.

Repeat rows 1 and 2 until pocket is about 4” tall; at the end of every row pick up the stitch 2 stitches above current stitch in last colum and then ssk/p2tog.

Bind off in i-cord using Adobe yarn.