Marginalised Hat
by Alison Hawke (QuantumTea) I have a rule: knit bright colours in winter, especially orange. This is a simple hat with a bright margin made from a contrasting hem. This hat was designed for a head that's 21 inches in circumference, but there's a lot of stretch in the fabric. You can use two contrasting colours, or use up your leftover sock yarn and make stripes. I used a 65g skein of Peppino sock yarn (made by The Yarns of Rhichard Devries) to make the crown of one hat, the brim of the next, and still had some leftovers.
Skills required: knitting in the round, k2tog, provisional crochet cast-on, picking up stitches from a provisional cast-on Gauge: 7.5st/in on US2 needles Needles: US2 (2.75mm) double point needles or circulars Materials: Less than 4og of fingering weight yarn for the crown, 20g of contrasting fingering weight yarn for the hem. Scrap yarn for the provisional cast-on. There is a video of Lucy Neatby demonstrating the provisional crochet cast-on here, she explains it better than I could: https: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3J-sUx_whE (I start with a few stitches of single crochet and tie a knot in the end that has the slipknot, to make removing the crochet easier.)
Pattern:
With US2 needles, using scrap yarn in a contrasting colour and the provisional crochet cast-on method, cast on 14ost. Work flat in stocking stitch for 5 rows (knit one row, purl the next), then join to work in the round. This makes it much less likely you'll end up with a twist in the first row and you can fix the small hole when you weave in the ends. Work another 9 rounds, for a total of 14 rounds. Purl the next round, then knit 14 more rounds. Carefully pick up stitches from the crochet cast-on, transferring them onto a spare needle or set of double points. You should have 139 picked-up stitches. Remove the scrap yarn from provisional cast-on. Knit each stitch together with its picked-up counterpart to form a hem, then knit the last stitch. Knit four more rounds in the hem colour, then switch to the contrasting colour. Knit until you have 5.5in of hat completed, measuring from the purl row of the hem to the needle.
Decrease rounds:
Round 1: K12, knit 2 together, repeat around (130 stitches) Round 2 and every other round afterwards until round 24: Knit all stitches Round 3: K11, k2tog, repeat (120 stitches) Round 5: K10, k2tog, repeat (110 stitches) Round 7: K9, k2tog, repeat (100 stitches) Round 9: K8, k2tog, repeat (90 stitches) Round 11: K7, k2tog, repeat (80 stitches) Round 13:K6, k2tog, repeat (70 stitches) Round 15: K5, k2tog, repeat (60 stitches) Round 17:K4, k2tog, repeat (50 stitches) Round 19: K3, k2tog, repeat (40 stitches) Round 21:K2, k2t0g, repeat (30 stitches) Round 23: K1, k2tog, repeat (20 stitches) Round 25: K2tog, repeat around (10 stitches). Round 26: K2tog, repeat around (5 stitches). Break yarn, thread through remaining stitches and secure. Weave the ends in, soak hat, and block lightly.
