Beginning a Top–Down Sleeve

When working a top–down sweater, the yoke comes first. The body and sleeves are separated, and then the body is knit. Finally, the sleeves are worked from the bottom of the yoke to the cuff. This detailed tutorial will show you how to get those sleeves started!

Three basic steps

Get your held sleeve stitches back on the needles
Pick up and knit the underarm stitches
Start knitting in the round

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Get your held sleeve stitches back on the needles

To knit the sleeve (essentially a small diameter tube), you’re going to need either double pointed needles (DPNs) or a long circular needle for the Magic Loop method. If your upper arm is 16″ or larger, you can also use a 16″ circular. If you have one, a 12″ circular also works for an upper arm of 12″ or larger.

To get the stitches off the waste yarn and back onto your needles WITHOUT dropping them (and subsequently crying and cursing!), I like to slide my needle through and THEN remove the waste yarn. I slide my needle into 3-4 stitches and then take out the waste yarn, repeating until all my stitches are on the needles, and the whole piece of waste yarn has been removed.

When working a sleeve using Magic Loop, I like to pull my cords out at the sides of the sleeves, but it’s simply a matter of preference. For DPNs, I like to have my stitches on three needles, using the fourth to knit with.

Here is what that sequence looks like:

Pick up and knit the underarm stitches

Different patterns will have different instructions for this process. Some will have you pick up and knit all the underarm stitches at the beginning or end of round. Some sleeves have an odd number of underarm stitches, so there will be an extra stitch to the right or left of your beginning of round (BOR) marker. The order might change, but the principles are the same. If this is new for you, check out our tutorial on how to pick up and knit stitches.

In addition to the specified number of underarm stitches, I like to pick up and knit 1 extra stitch from the body of the sweater on each side of the underarm stitches. Then, on the next round, I decrease these stitches to get to the correct stitch count.

For my Classic Cardigan pattern, I followed these steps:

Pick up and knit 4 stitches (that’s half of my underarm stitches), beginning at the centre of the cast-on stitches at the underarm.
Pick up and knit 1 extra stitch from the body of the cardigan.
Knit across the previously held stitches that have been returned to the needles.
Pick up and knit 1 stitch from the body of the cardigan.
Pick up and knit 4 more stitches at the underarm.

This brings me back to the centre of the underarm where I’ll place my BOR marker, and I’ve got 2 extra stitches.

I’ve got my 8 stitches cast-on at the underarm.

I insert my needle into the 5th stitch from front to back.

I pull the loop through and then pick up and knit that 1st stitch.

Here I’ve got my 4 stitches picked up, plus 1 from the body of the sweater.

Here I’ve knit around to the other side, and I’m ready to pick up and knit 1 stitch from the body of the sweater and 4 stitches from the underarm.

Now I’ve got all my stitches picked up, plus an extra 2. On the next round, I will decrease those 2 stitches to bring me to the correct stitch count.

Start knitting in the round

Once I’ve completed the pick up, I’ll have 2 extra stitches, so on the next round I’ll knit to the extra stitch and then k2tog. Then I’ll knit around to 1 stitch before the extra stitch on the other side and join them together with an ssk.

The 1st stitch on my left hand needle is the extra stitch picked up at the underarm. I’m going to join it together with the 2nd stitch on my left hand needle with a k2tog.

The 1st stitch on my right hand needle is the k2tog. Those 2 stitches have been joined together.

Here, the first 2 stitches on my left hand needle are the last stitch of the previously held stitches and the extra stitch picked up from the body of the sweater. I’m going to join these 2 stitches together with an ssk.

All of my stitches have been picked up, and I’m ready to work my sleeve!

Here’s what it looks like when all the stitches have been picked up with DPNs.

Now you’re ready to start knitting your sleeve!

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