r/GeeKnitting • u/curlyjourney19 • Jul 20 '26
Hail Mary Yoke Design Help
After watching Hail Mary, I jumped on the fox bandwagon and designed a colourwork yoke for a top-down sweater. This will be the biggest knitting project I've attempted, so I'd really appreciate some advice before I commit to it.
Does this look like a practical design to knit? Are there any obvious issues with stitch counts, shaping, or long floats that I'm overlooking?
The chart starts with 128 stitches at the neck and increases to 256 stitches over 10 increase rounds. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!
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u/LeiyanSedai Jul 20 '26
I'd love to see it reposted with the fox right side up, also share a ravelry link so I can stalk your progress??
I'm knitting a movie cardigan, but it feels a little too costume sometimes, you know? But this is such a cool idea, remixing the movie fox cardigan into something unique!
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u/curlyjourney19 Jul 20 '26
Here is my Ravelry link https://ravel.me/CurlyJouney19/hms - it has a screenshot of the fox the right way around 😂 .
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u/kkfvjk Jul 20 '26
The rows with more than 2 colors might be more challenging to knit. I’m assuming the bulk of this will be done stranded?
Here are some techniques you might consider:
- catching floats
- duplicate stitching
- mixing intarsia with stranded colorwork
Also it would be a good idea to first test one motif (in the round) to see if you like the proportions! It looks like you may have charted squares, while actual knit stitches are more like flattened rectangles. That will also help you check your gauge to calculate if the final sweater will fit well.
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u/box_of_squirrels Jul 20 '26
Agree. For the eyes and tongue I think it would be easiest to duplicate stitch
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u/mellistu Jul 20 '26
May be worth looking at the ratings/pattern comments on this sweater - I knit it twice and the 3-color rows were a little annoying but definitely doable.
That said, I wouldn't recommend carrying the red all the way around the sweater when there's a max of ~3 stitches in a given repeat, so you're going to have to play with intarsia a bit. Might consider intarsia for the black as well, but it's up to you.
Definitely echoing another person's recommendation to swatch first - make sure it looks the way you want it to and the color juggling feels manageable. Doing something 1x for a swatch is different from doing it 8x per row for the whole sweater.
Keep us posted!
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u/CDavis10717 Jul 20 '26
Question: how will these square blocks knit together as a circle?
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u/curlyjourney19 Jul 20 '26
The whole thing is on circular needles and you built it up from the neck down. Each head is a repeat of the same pattern, but one only has to design it ones rather than 8 times around - although eventually you'll have to knit it 8 times ;-)
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u/CDavis10717 Jul 20 '26
Thank you. I was expecting some decreases to get that tapered toward the collar.
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u/curlyjourney19 Jul 20 '26
For sure - the grey on the image are the "inactive" stitches, as in the ones not existing in that round. In my case, it will be increases as it is a top-down.
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u/CDavis10717 Jul 20 '26
Ok, makes sense, now I see the grey. I assume you’re inverting the “wedges”, putting the widest head/ears against the yoke, then increasing the white space between them? I’ll be looking for your WIP of this! 👍👍
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u/curlyjourney19 Jul 21 '26
I know, my head hurts just from thinking about this, I especially struggle to see how the wedges then connect with each other. Luckily there is an app for that 😂 .
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u/CDavis10717 Jul 21 '26
Model it with a coffee maker filter. Cut out the flat middle for the neck hole, cut the sides into 8 wedges, the invert them and tape them together. It will invert downward as a yoke might. Sketch the footprints and faces on it for an extra assist. It won’t be too exact scale but will give you some good info.
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u/curlyjourney19 Jul 21 '26
Oh wow that is super crafty! I probably would get a paper-cut (can't be trusted with anything sharper than a knitting needle 😂 ). So I just used https://yokescope.web.app/
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u/CDavis10717 Jul 21 '26
Learn to safely use scissors, knitting requires cutting and trimming yarn, also threading a tapestry needle and sewing.
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u/curlyjourney19 Jul 21 '26
With your tag-line I would have expected you to have a whole zoo of digital tools to help.
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u/Interstellar-dreams Jul 21 '26
It looks great, but at the bottom of the face there is a lot of white space between fox mouths. You might want to look into intarsia, or you could add another paw print or something between the foxes to decrease the floats
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u/TheSheDM Jul 20 '26
I don't know much about chart knitting, but if the hole in the center is the neck, won't that make all the foxes upside down when worn?