320 Alar Cabled Cardigan - Knitting Pattern for Women in Valley Yarns Northampton

320 Alar Cabled Cardigan – Knitting Pattern for Women in Valley Yarns Northampton

The 320 Alar Cabled Cardigan is a beautifully structured women's knitting pattern designed by Kirsten Hipsky. This intermediate-level pattern produces a classic, seamed cardigan featuring intricate cable panels and refined texture work throughout. With finished sizes ranging from 36 to 52 inches in bust circumference, the pattern is thoughtfully graded to fit a wide range of body types, making it a versatile addition to any knitter's project queue.

What Is Being Made

This pattern creates a women's cabled cardigan worked in pieces and seamed together for a polished, structured finish. The garment features a sophisticated arrangement of named cable panels — the Gull Panel and the Tern Panel — set against a Seed Stitch background, giving the cardigan a rich, dimensional texture. The upper body construction separates the fronts and back at the underarm, with each section worked using its own skein. Armhole shaping and neck shaping are both addressed in the pattern, with bound-off stitches at the underarm and neck to create clean, tailored lines.

Techniques Used

• Seamed construction: The cardigan is worked flat in separate pieces that are later joined, a traditional method that lends structure and stability to the finished garment.
• Cables: The signature design elements of this cardigan are its cable panels. The Gull Panel and Tern Panel are repeated across the body in a deliberate arrangement — for example, the back features the sequence Gull Panel, Tern Panel, and Gull Panel repeated three times, flanked by seed stitch sections and twisted purl stitches (p1b).
• Buttonholes: As a cardigan, the pattern incorporates buttonhole construction, a key technique for finishing the front bands neatly and functionally.
• Worked flat: All pieces are knitted back and forth in rows rather than in the round, which is typical for seamed garment construction.
• Armhole and neck shaping: Stitches are bound off at the underarm (9 stitches per side) and at the neck (11 stitches at the beginning of two rows) to shape the upper body precisely.

Stitches Used

• Cable stitches — forming the named Gull Panel and Tern Panel motifs that give the cardigan its distinctive texture and visual interest
• Seed Stitch — used in side panels and as a textural contrast to the cables, with stitch counts varying by size (5, 10, 14, 19, or 23 stitches per section)
• Purl through back loop (p1b) — a twisted purl stitch used as a subtle detail to define the transitions between panels
• Knit and purl stitches — fundamental to all panels and the overall flat construction

Materials

The pattern is written specifically for Valley Yarns Northampton, a 100% wool worsted weight yarn that comes in 247-yard, 100-gram skeins. The sample shown in the pattern is worked in the colorway Bright Blue Heather. The pattern calls for 6 (7, 8, 9, 10) skeins depending on the size being made.

Two needle sizes are required: US size 7 (4.5mm) needles for the main fabric and US size 5 (3.75mm) needles, likely used for ribbing or border sections. Knitters should work to a gauge of 24 stitches and 24 rows over 4 inches using the larger needles, and should swatch carefully before beginning, as gauge is critical to achieving the correct finished size.

Skill Level and Pattern Format

Rated as intermediate in difficulty, the 320 Alar Cabled Cardigan is well suited to knitters who are comfortable reading cable charts, working multiple panels simultaneously, and managing separate skeins during upper body construction. The pattern is available as a