Rathcooney set

Rathcooney Fingerless Mittens and Hat

From Contemporary Irish Knits

I’ve always loved this stitch pattern, the cocoon stitch.  It is so delicate and subtle, increases and decreases move the single rows of knit stitches in and out.  The idea for this set came from the stitch pattern, I was trying it out and began experimenting with how it worked flowing from the stitch into ribbing.  I loved how it worked, the cocoon stitch is perfect for drawing in the wrist and head band for both the hat and mitts and then the ribbing forms the body of both.  As an added bonus this ribbing looks extra good when decreases are worked between it to form the crown of the hat!

The wonderful yarn for this set was donated by Beata from Hedgehog Fibres.  I knit the set using 4mm (US6) size needles which gives a fairly tight gauge for this yarn.  This helps for two reasons, firstly it gives an extra warm hat and mitt set and also the tighter gauge really allows the stitch pattern to pop out and create a very sculptural effect.

All of the edgings on the set are worked as I-cord.  I love the clean, finished look this gives to a knit, simple to work but very slick!

The mitt set is knit in size 7.75″/19.5cm shown with some positive ease and the hat is shown in 19.25″/49cm with around 2″/5cm of negative ease.  Remember that hats work best with a little negative ease so that they stay on snugly!

The full set was knit using Hedgehog Fibres Silk Merino singles (50% silk, 50% merino wool; 164 yd./150m per 100g skein) in color Winter Thaw.  Beata has told me that this yarn now has extra yardage so 2 skeins should knit that full set for all sizes!

The gauge for the ribbing is  25 sts x 30 rows = 4″ (10cm) and for the cocoon stitch pattern it is 28 sts x 32 rows = 4″ (10cm).

6 thoughts on “Rathcooney set

  1. I’m a new knitter and feel uncertain about the cocoon stitch, any good reference as to how to do it? Thank you! P.S. My friend brought me a present of the yarn and your book from her trip to Ireland, we live in Maine in the USA

  2. This particular pattern is in both charted and written form in the book. It looks somewhat more complex than it is! I’d suggest jumping right in and swatching to see how you go.

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