While waiting for my Virtual Yarns Kit for the Damselfly to arrive I knitted Alice Starmore’s Margaret Beaufort from Tudor Roses using dark grey (mix 0519) Drops Lima from my stash.
Like the Strathspey, given that it is one colour only and that large parts of it are in stocking stitch, it is a relatively easy and quick knit, compared to other Alice Starmore designs.
As always I made a couple of adjustments to the pattern:
Alice Starmore’s patterns mostly have a very tight gauge. I had to go down to 3 mm needles to get it right. I did not make a swatch, but started with the sleeves to make sure I had the right gauge. 😉
I knitted the bodice in one piece and the sleeves in the round so as to avoid having side and sleeve seams. (Less work and less bulk!)
I used German short rows instead of the wrap-and-turn method throughout. I find these much easier and I like the result better.
I wanted a more fitted garment but have rather wide hips, so I used the medium size for the peplum and the small size for the edging and the rest of the bodice, and I decreased both at the side seams and at the “darts” on every decrease row, i.e. 8 decreases x 4 rows = 32 stitches decreased for the waist.
Even though I love the buttons at the back, I knew I would never wear it that way, so I made a higher neckline at what was going to be the back for me.
I wanted the collar to go right up to the middle of the button band, so that the left and right collar meet at the front without a gap over the button band. This meant that after having knitted the neckband, I had to attach the button band so that I could pick up the stitches to knit the collar.
I cast on 109 stitches for the button band and then attached it to the bodice with the 3-needle method, as I have described in my blogpost on the Jane Seymour jacket. Button bands tend to stretch, so I often find that fewer stitches give a better result.
For the sleeves, I started with 49 sts increasing up to 79 sts, i.e. small size at the wrist and medium size at armhole height, increasing every 7th row. I have rather short arms and like to have rather tight sleeves at the wrists.
I used the following sleeve cap, which is more or less the one I used on the Strathspey and which I have found to work well for me. The decreases are steeper at the beginning resulting in less fabric at the armpits.
Sleeve cap:
Cast off 5 sts at beginning of next 2 rows, 3 sts at beginning of next 2 rows, 1 st at each end of following 3 rows. Work 1 WS row without shaping. Cast off 1 st at each end of next and every following alternate row 10 times. Cast off 1 st at each end of next and every following row 5 times. Cast off 3 sts at beginning of next 2 rows. Cast off remaining 21 sts, knitting 2 together at beginning and end of middle panel.
Annaplexis 