FO: Hammer & Sickle Hat
Years ago, I made a stockinette watch cap as a handknitted wedding gift for a friend. He wanted to boldly wear his politics on his head and specifically requested the colour combo and pattern. Last week, I made a second one just like it as another gift. Voila the Hammer & Sickle Hat:
The last time, I had winged the motif and not kept any notes (or taken a decent-enough photo!); I just remembered that it fell unhappily between fair-isle and intarsia, and there were long floats to deal with at the back and puckered stitches. This time, I charted several motifs in MS Word (using these fonts), to play around with the gauge and surface area of the hat, and finally decided that rather than knit the motif, I was better off using duplicate stitch. So I embroidered it on, and although it took me a while to get the fall of the stitches just right – duplicate stitch is harder than it looks – I think I like the final results better through this method. (Also, taking a photo of yourself embroidering something is just about as hard as photographing black yarn!)
So, the Project Specs:
Yarn: Vardhman Pure Wool bought at Samrat Woollen House here in Pune. 1.5 balls in black. (I think it’s DK weight, but it doesn’t specify yardage). Also, some red laceweight held quadruple, for the motif. I wanted it to be a little thicker and pop out of the black.
Needle: Size 4 (3.5 mm), 16 inch circular and DPNs
Gauge: 6 spi.
Size: 22″ circumference and about 11″ length total from cast-on to crown.
Notes: I cast on 120 st in the round, knit K2,P2 for six inches, then 20 rows in stockinette. Then I divided the hat into ten equal parts and decreased evenly at the end of each part – k10, k2tog, repeat all around, and so on, decreasing the number of knit stitches before the k2tog every alternate round. I made three motifs of different sizes before I got one that fit the stockinette portion well. I don’t know how many knitters out there would like to make a hat like this or use the hammer & sickle motif, but let me know if you’d like the other charts for a thinner-gauge hat or any other project. If you’d like the full hat pattern, I can write it up as a .pdf and put it up here and on Ravelry.
It’s a roomy and warm hat, and I sure hope the recipient likes it! Stay tuned for another FO coming up hot on this one’s heels. That one, I’m hoping to photograph with the wearer in it in a few days..
