Have you heard of Double Knitting? Have you tried it?

Many years ago I did a little Double Knitting for the belt of a cardigan in my Contemporary Irish Knits book. I revisited it again last year for the belt of my Chroi cardigan. This technique is ideal for belts, it creates a thick, sturdy double layered fabric that always lies flat, but this was the extent of my Double Knitting knowledge and it really was just the top of the iceberg.

Single colour Double Knitting is the easiest to work. You can knit one stitch and then slip the next one with the yarn in front. This means you are knitting only the stitches for the side you are seeing and slipping the stitch for the other side. It feels a bit like working brioche but bringing the yarn in front rather than over the needle.

For our Winter Season’s Club, Eimear Earley wanted to dip her toe into Double Knitting. She has been fixated with the swirling shapes used in many Insular La Tène style items found here in Ireland and failed to find a knitting technique that could be used to interpret them. She discovered that two-colour Double Knitting was a great choice for bringing her swirling shapes to life with the Cruinne Cowl.

Two-Colour Double Knitting

I quickly discovered that two-colour Double Knitting is a bit more complex than single colour, however the basics are still the same.

You are working a fabric that is double sided but this time you will have a different colour on each side.

The standard way of working this is to work the stitches on each row as a ‘pair’. On the first row you will be working the ‘front’ colour A as a knit stitch and then bringing both yarns to the front and purling with the ‘background’ colour B. Then when you are working on the other side the colours will be reversed, with the second colour B now being the knit colour and colour A being purled.

The tricky part about two-colour Double Knitting is yarn management.

With stranded colourwork it is generally easiest to hold one yarn in each hand, although you can also hold both in a single hand. With Double Knitting it is considerably easier to keep both yarns in one hand.

In fact, Eimear discovered that using a yarn guide like in the image above, was the easiest way to work it. It allowed you to easily move both colours back and forth and ‘pick’ the colour you needed for a particular stitch.

Two-Colour Double Knitting Chart

The next stage of Double Knitting is creating a motif. This is done, as with stranded colourwork, using a chart. The difference though is that you will ‘read’ the chart differently.

With Double Knitting each ‘box’ in the chart represents a stitch ‘pair’ the knit from the front of the work and it’s matching purl twin from the other side. This means that you will be alternating colours back and forth as you work across the row of the Double Knitting colourwork chart.

While this may sound a little confusing, this is where the Seasons Club comes in! I’ll show you how to navigate and master each stage of Double Knitting in two colours.

Cruinne Cowl Overview

Now that I’ve told you about the different types of Double Knitting we can take a look at the beautiful Cruinne Cowl that Eimear Earley designed for our Winter Seasons Club. This is an ideal project to learn Double Knitting with as it works through the different types of Double Knitting and has options to simplify if you want to work through it more quickly.

The cowl is worked with two colours of Nua Sport, with two skeins of each colour needed. It is worked flat, long enough to use wrapped twice, and then buttoned at the end. This gives you the option of working a shorter length if you wish or using it as a scarf instead.

You begin with a section single colour Double Knitting, and then move into two-colour. Once this section is complete it’s time for the two-colour Double Knitting chart. If you are new to Double Knitting this takes a while to get comfortable with so you’ll need to take your time! It does pick up speed as you become more comfortable with the technique.

How To Purchase

These patterns are part of our Winter Seasons Club 2025. That means when you join the club you get access to this pattern plus an extensive set step-by-step videos on everything you need to complete your double knitting cowl. We will also have live recordings of our zoom sessions where we chat through the pattern and technique with Eimear and myself.

If Double Knitting is new for you or if you would like to improve, this is a Seasons Club you won’t want to miss. All you have to do is click this button to find out more and join the club: