Choosing yarn for your colourwork sweater

This post is part of a multi-part series that covers the Strange Brew colourwork yoke sweater recipe! To get the Strange Brew recipe pattern (it’s written for 3 gauges, and includes 25 sizes from baby through women’s and men’s 4XL) click here.

This colourwork tutorial series will cover:

Which yarn shall I use for my colourwork sweater?

There are SO MANY YARNS out there. We love it, of course, because it’s fabulous to have a plethora of fibers, spins, colours and weights to choose from! But this can also be a bit daunting, so which yarn should you choose for your colourwork sweater?

The short answer: pretty much anything you can block, and we really recommend a wool or wool blend.

This doesn’t mean you can’t knit colourwork if you are a vegan or have a wool allergy of course, but wool tends to be the most forgiving. Wool has what is called ‘memory’, which will help your stitches stay where you want them and stop your garment from stretching out of shape over time.

There’s a big world of wool out there, from rustic woolly wools to smooth plied superwash Merinos, and everything in between. If you take a stroll through your LYS give all the yarns a feel. You will see the variety in textures, softness, and spin. There are pros and cons to any choice and a lot will depend on the yarns you have available to you and the palette you are most drawn to.

How are the yarns different?

Yarns differ in the degree to which they slip smoothly past each other, vs. the degree to which they ‘stick’ one to the next, and have fuzzy furry bits that fill in the gaps.

Because of its fuzzy / furry / stickiness, a rustic Shetland yarn, for example,
is more forgiving when it comes to colourwork than a smooth, round, single-ply superwash sock yarn is. It hides more of the slight imperfections in tension.

It is also worth noting that superwash yarns tend to ‘grow’ with blocking, and with wear. They are a bit stretchier so make sure to block your swatch and consider this effect when choosing your sweater size, as well as body and sleeve lengths.

In Strange Brew we used an array of yarns, from woolen-spun Brooklyn Tweed Shelter and single-ply softly spun Icelandic Lopi, to the smooth and round Quince and Co Chickadee, and Stone Wool Cormo, which has a textured quality because of the yarn’s 2-ply construction.

• 

• 

• 

• 

Collect a rainbow:

Of course, it wouldn’t be a discussion of yarns for colourwork if we didn’t include the colour! We love knitting colourwork in yarns that have a great big rainbow of a palette available. This allows us to add (and add and add…) to our collection, knowing that the yarns will work well together, and that our painter’s palette available for colourwork will grow and grow!

Once you find a yarn that you love, we think it’s worth investing in a rainbow of your own; colourwork is rather addictive! It’s lovely to go to the stash and pull out a new combination to try when the inspiration strikes.

Hats and cowls are the perfect place to trial a new yarn, colour combination, or stitch pattern. Download our free Anthology hat & cowl recipe pattern, which has instructions for 3 gauges and baby-to-big sizing. Cast on for a swatch hat today!

Feel like taking your yarn research to the next level? Once you find a yarn you like, knit yourself a hat and wear it for a week. Then you will REALLY know how the yarn knits up and wears. It’s as accurate a swatch as you can get without actually knitting a whole sweater.

You Can Mix and Match!

Emily is a big fan of mixing and matching across yarn brands, types, and even mixing weights! It’s worthwhile knowing that this is possible, because it really opens up the palette of colours you have available in your existing stash! She has successfully worked colourwork that mixed aran, worsted, DK and even a sport weight yarn or two, all with different spin types / qualities, within the same hat. If you hold a sock weight yarn double, it could be used alongside a worsted or aran weight in stranded colourwork. So feel free to experiment with mixing and matching. Read Combining Yarn Weights and Types in Colourwork for more on this topic.

So, now that your mind is full of yarn-y possibilities you can start on your swatching journey! We will be adding tutorials on swatching for colourwork next week!

---

More colourwork from Tin Can Knits: