I liked the pointy star shape the stripes make; it turns out the key is to do center decreases lined up over each other, then block the finished beret over a dinner plate! The pattern itself has the decreases written incorrectly, so they wouldn't line up, even though in the pattern picture it was clearly knitted that way! I subbed yarns from fingering to sportweight and changed the needle size and so I changed the number of stitches and so on, from 160 CO to 128. Made a deeper brim in 2x2 ribbing instead of 1x1, so it fits snugly, I have a small head circumference. I like the way it turned out, if I make another (I have more of the same yarn in different colors) I'd make the beret part a bit bigger, I think, and block over a big dinner plate, so it's an exaggerated beret!