I made this following Caryn Schaffer’s “Handsome Chris Pullover” pattern. She reverse-engineered the cable charts and pattern by looking at the Aran sweater worn by Chris Evans in the movie Knives Out. My name is Chris, I’ve seen that movie, and I’ve been wanting to try a cabled sweater and a seamed sweater… so this was a good project! My mom and sister gave me 10 skeins of Aran-colored Patons Classic Wool Worsted yarn for my birthday, which worked out perfectly for this sweater!

I have about a 39” chest and wanted 4+ inches of ease. I got close to the pattern gauge with the recommended US7 needle, so decided to do the M size (44” chest) but with the length of the L. Finished dimensions:

Chest: 44”
Length (shoulder seam to bottom of hem): 26”
Yardage: 930g (1,650 meters)

As mentioned in the notes below, I did my sleeves a bit narrower even than the narrow option provided by the pattern (and 19” long).

Overall the fit is good and I’m happy with the sweater! My only two complaints:

• This was my first time creating a seamed garment and I had trouble keeping rows aligned. If I had added a stockinette selvage stitch to each side of the body it would have made things easier (and would have provided purl columns between the cables where the body is seamed). Though I think things look fine (see seam photos).

• Most of my sloppy knitting blocked out okay, but there is noticeable rowing out in the central panel (Panel C) especially on the front I think that panel of single cables would look tidier if I had twisted the stitches.

Brief timeline of the project:

September 6: Swatched and decided on size M.

September 26: Finally cast on! long-tail tubular cast on (using the “Casting On Kitchener Rib with Main Yarn” from Big Book of Knitting). Cast on 166 using US5 needles, then 4 rows of doublknitting using US4 needles, then 3” twisted rib using US5. I used this same cast on for the sleeve cuffs. For an online tutorial: https://www.purlsoho.com/create/long-tail-tubular-cast-on...

Front and Back:

• Bind off after 13 repeats of Chart C.
• Begin front neck-shaping bindoffs on row 139 (7th row of 11th repeate of Chart C). The neck shaping takes 17 rows, so this will make the front the same length (number of rows) as the back.

October 14: Decided to start on back while front was still in progress so that I have something portable to work on during my chess tournament

November 11: Body pieces done, begin on sleeves!

November 13: sleeve is too wide, start over! I think even the cuff of the slimmer sleeve will be too wide, so I’m doing a modified version of the slimmer version:

• Cast on 66 (tubular) -- do not twist first row of tubular cast on double knitting (do twist second row)
• 20 rounds of twisted rib to match hem
• Modified set up / increase for 66-stitch cuff (WS): (k1, kfb, pfb, p1) 2 times, k2, (kfb, p3, pfb, k1) 2 times, ptbl1, k4, pfb, k4, p2, k4, pfb, k4, ptbl1, (kfb, p3, pfb, k1) 2 times, (k1, kfb, pfb, p1) 2 times, k2 (84 stitches)
• do the pattern’s optional increases until on first row after complete C chart
• sleeve increase: do lifted increases on the inside of the edge purl column, and maintain seed stitch pattern.

November 21: Finally blocking front and back so I can seam them and try on sleeve!

November 27: Seaming the first sleave to the body! Picking up ratio of sleeve:body::5:6 (about 60 stitches of the body on each side of shoulder). I didn’t do the best job keeping the sleeve the same number of rows on the front and back of the body… it turned out okay, but there’s probably a better way to lay out the pieces for seaming than I did…

November 29: Did collar and seamed second sleeve! I wanted to try a doubled collar. This is what I did: picked up an even number of stitches, did 10 rounds of ktbl1, p1, then purl an entire round, then 10 rounds of p1, ktbl1. Fold the collar inside the sweater and bind off stitches together with picked up stitches as in a three-needle bind off. This turned out fine, but I think whip stitching the collar to the inside of the neck opening would have been faster and resulted in a less bulky seam.

November 30: Finally finished seaming and weaving in ends!