Jacket in Cara in Lana Grossa - 2112 - Downloadable PDF

Lana Grossa Cara Jacket – Knitting Pattern Summary (Design 21, Lookbook 12)

What You Are Making

This downloadable PDF pattern from Lana Grossa guides you through knitting a classic, elegant jacket — a structured, button-front garment with shaped shoulders and integrated front bands. The design is identified as Design 21 from Lookbook 12 and is sized for women's sizes 36/38, 40/42, and 44. It is rated as an intermediate difficulty project, making it well-suited for knitters who are comfortable with shaping, multi-stitch pattern management, and working separate garment pieces that are later seamed together.

Design Details

The jacket features a refined, tailored silhouette with carefully shaped shoulders achieved through stepped bind-offs. The front bands are integrated directly into the left and right front pieces rather than picked up separately, giving the finished garment a clean, professional finish. Eight 15 mm mother-of-pearl buttons by UNION KNOPF (item 37604) are used for the button closure, adding a luxurious, polished detail that complements the soft, natural-toned yarn.

Yarn and Materials

• Yarn: Lana Grossa Cara — a worsted weight yarn with a sophisticated fiber blend of 57% baby alpaca, 33% cotton, and 10% Merino wool, used in Beige (colorway 3).
• Yarn quantity: 700 g for size 36/38, 750 g for size 40/42, and 800 g for size 44.
• Needles: Size 3.5 mm straight needles, size 5 mm straight needles, and a size 3.5 mm circular needle.
• Notions: Eight 15 mm mother-of-pearl buttons by UNION KNOPF, item 37604.

Techniques Used

• Half-brioche rib: The main body fabric is worked in a half-brioche rib stitch pattern, a technique that creates a beautifully textured, lofty fabric with excellent drape. Brioche knitting involves working yarn-overs together with slipped stitches, producing a deeply ribbed, reversible-looking fabric with a squishy, dimensional quality.
• Integrated front bands: The left front band is worked as part of the left front piece from the cast-on, with a dedicated 9-stitch band section maintained throughout.
• Shaping with increases: Sleeve or body shaping is achieved by increasing stitches at each end of right-side rows, then repeating increases every 18th row a specified number of times, with all increased stitches incorporated into the half-brioche rib pattern.
• Shoulder shaping: Shoulders are shaped using a stepped bind-off method — binding off groups of 4 stitches and 5 stitches at each shoulder edge across multiple rows, varying by size, to create a smooth, angled shoulder line.
• Working in pieces: The garment is constructed by knitting separate pieces (back, left front, right front, and likely sleeves) that are seamed together upon finishing.

Stitches Used

• Half-brioche rib — the primary stitch pattern used throughout the main body sections, creating a rich textured fabric.
• Knit and purl combinations — used within the front band sections, beginning and ending with knit stitches as noted in the pattern instructions.
• Standard cast-on and bind-off — used for starting pieces and for shoulder and neckline shaping.

Construction Notes

The pattern is written with instructions given first for size 36/38, with figures for sizes 40/42 and 44 given in parentheses. Where only a single figure appears, it applies to all sizes. The left front begins with a cast-on of 68 (72, 76) stitches on size 3.5 mm needles. The back piece grows to 139