Rowan Sleeveless Jacket Waistcoat Knitting Pattern

Rowan Sleeveless Jacket by Georgia Farrell

What is Being Made

The Rowan Sleeveless Jacket is a fitted waistcoat-style garment designed to be worn as a layering piece. This knitted sleeveless jacket features a structured silhouette with shaping at the waist and armholes, available in five sizes ranging from 81-86 cm to 122-127 cm bust measurements (32-34 inches to 48-50 inches). The finished garment measures between 112.5 cm and 152.5 cm in actual bust circumference, providing a close-fitting design suitable for various body types.

Techniques Used

This pattern employs several key knitting techniques to create its structured shape. The jacket is worked flat on straight needles, meaning pieces are knitted back and forth in rows rather than in the round. The garment is constructed using a bottom-up approach, with pieces knitted starting from the lower edges and working upward toward the shoulders. All pieces are seamed together after completion, creating clean finished edges and allowing for precise shaping. The design includes waist shaping achieved through strategic decreasing, with decreases worked near the edges to create a tapered silhouette. Armhole shaping is incorporated through additional decreases, and the back neck and shoulders are shaped through a combination of casting off stitches and decreasing to create proper garment structure.

Stitches Used

The Rowan Sleeveless Jacket utilizes fundamental knitting stitches combined into a textured pattern. The primary stitch pattern is a rib pattern created by alternating knit and purl stitches across rows. Specifically, the pattern uses a repeat of P1 (purl 1 stitch) and K7 (knit 7 stitches) to create vertical lines of texture throughout the garment. Additional stitches employed include K (knit) for stockinette sections, P (purl) for reverse stockinette and patterning, sl 1 (slip 1 stitch), psso (pass slipped stitch over), and K2tog (knit 2 together) for decreasing. The pattern also incorporates P2tog (purl 2 together) decreases for shaping the neckline and shoulders. Edge stitches are maintained in garter stitch (knit every row) to create neat selvage edges suitable for seaming.

Materials

The Rowan Sleeveless Jacket is designed to be knitted with Rowan Brushed Fleece yarn, a soft and textured fiber. The yarn quantities vary by size: smaller sizes require 8 balls of 50-gram skeins, while the largest size requires 10 balls. The pattern was photographed in two colorways: Tarn 254 and Crag 253. Knitting is worked on 6mm (US 10) needles (one pair of straight needles), with the pattern specifying a tension of 13 stitches and 20 rows measured over 10 cm (4 inches) in the rib pattern using these needles. Additional notions required include stitch markers for tracking pattern repeats and stitch holders for managing stitches during shaping, particularly when working the neck and shoulder shaping on the back piece.

Skill Level

This pattern is rated at Skill Level 2, indicating it is suitable for knitters with some experience beyond absolute beginners. The intermediate difficulty reflects the combination of stitch pattern work, multiple decreasing techniques, and the need to manage shaping across multiple pieces that must be seamed together with precision.