I’ve just returned from a short holiday up and down the Canadian west coast - along the way we stopped at the Pollen Sweater Factory in Lund.
While there the lady showed me a lovely bamboo poncho type garment (which, sadly, is not shown on their website). She suggested that it would be an excellent garment to wear while breast feeding, and I was inclined to agree (as I’m sure you’re all sick of hearing about, I’m big, and fat and pregnant). She wanted $180 for this shawl which was a bit rich for my blood, so I looked at it and it will actually be very easy to knit.
Now, for the question - The garment is a simple oblong 171 stitches wide done in stocking stitch. The oblong is folded in half and sewn up one edge starting at the cast on point and finishing about 12 inches from the fold to create a hole for your head to poke through.
Unfolded it would be about 7 feet long - folded about 3.5.
Now, the question I have is, the edges didn’t curl. The bottoms didn’t curl. Nothing was curling. Stocking stitch always curls. You can use the curling of stocking stitch as a design element. So what the heck is going on?
Does the weight of the bamboo keep the garment from curling? (I don’t think so - I’ve made other bamboo items and they curled in the regular way). Or is it a finishing technique that I’m forgetting, or a type of stitch that looks like stocking stitch, but is something else? FWIW, The garment did seem heavier than you would expect given it’s dimensions, but not a lot heavier.
I think badbadrubberpiggy has it. A non-curling edge, even if it’s only an inch or so deep, will keep stockinette from curling.
ETA: It’s pretty easy, too. On the top and bottom edge, just do three or four rows of 1x1 ribbing. On the side edges, you want the first 4 and last 4 stitches to be done in garter stitch, i.e. knit those stitches regardless of which side you’re working. You may need to adjust your per-row stitch count, especially if you’re doing a patterned piece. If it’s just stockinette, you can either add eight stitches to the original total or just do the original total because it doesn’t make a real difference.
Humm - the double rib trim is a suggestion, for sure; however, it’s not what was done to this particular garment. And there certainly wasn’t a garter stitch edge on it.
I almost wondered if a reinforcing stitch (with thread, not yarn) or something similar was run down the edges to keep them from curling? But I have no idea what that would be…
This is what I was wondering - I’ve also never aggressively blocked bamboo - the patterns I’ve used it for have always had the curling edge as a design feature.
Hummm - now that I think about it, maybe it WAS double knit - as I said, the garment seemed heaver than I thought it should have.
I assume it must have been done on a machine as double knitting with the same colour on both sides by hand seems like it would be a bit of a nightmare…
I bet you could accomplish it with a good steam-block; bamboo is so slippery that it tends to relax and stretch out after it’s knitted up even without a blocking, especially if it’s knit at a looser gauge. You could probably get it perfectly flat if you pin it out and steam the bejesus out of it.
I’ve never tried it, though, so it’s possible I’m completely insane.
This might be a good plan - I’m planning out how to double knit the thing with the same colour on both sides and it’s making my head hurt. If the garment is large enough, a bit a curling might not be a big deal anyway.
The other option is to double knit it in different colours - I wanted acid green - I guess I could put navy blue on the back and it might look good.
No, I’m pretty sure it didn’t, although that would be another solution.
I suppose I can do whatever I like, as it will be my garment although the double knit with green and one side and blue on the other is starting to appeal to me.
I’ve never tried double knitting with two colors, but with a single color, it’s a lot like ribbing, in that you’re moving the thread back and forth with every stitch. It can be pretty tedious but it does produce a nice appearance – and it’s definitely heavy.
The method I learned for double knitting only uses one strand. You knit a stitch, bring the yarn forward as if to purl, but instead slip the stitch, move the yarn back again, and knit. Basically, you’re working every other stitch, and slipping every other stitch, but you bring the yarn forward before slipping the stitch.
I just tried googling for double knitting instructions, and almost every site uses two strands in different colors. I may have to give it a try! In the meantime, though, I did find one site that gave instructions for basic double knitting using only one strand: http://www.sheeptoshawl.com/charity/archives/2006/02/entry_186.html.
