Rorschach Jacket is ready for the spotlight. She’s painted New York City red (seriously… she did the East Side bars with a cowboy showing his concealed handgun permit to bouncers… but that’s for another post) and now she’s ripe for her debut on the internets:

Click for bigger, as always. This is, as far as Google and I can tell, the very first Elizabeth Zimmermann Rorschach Jacket to model live on the web. I hope it won’t be the last, because this excellent pattern deserves a renaissance. Specs:

Rorschach Jacket from Knitting Workshop

Unspun Icelandic wool, two strands held double, most of four 300 yd-wheels cream and most of one blacksheep

US #8 needles, 4 stitches per inch

I cast on the number of stitches given for the 40″ size, but stopped when I reached the body width for the 36″ size. In other words, I have a long torso and a medium bust and I wanted a slimmer, less boxy fit. After weighing the many opinions you offered about buttons, I went with the smaller, square-within-a-circle choice. And I’m happy with the effect. I did make some slight modifications to the sleeves, working them over 80 stitches (decreased over 10 ridges to 70 for a small gusset) instead of the suggested 1/3 of the total for a blousey look. Then I nipped them back to 38 stitches for a snug cuff. I can’t tell whether EZ’s version had full length sleeves, but I made mine 3/4 length. I also sewed the two halves together inside-out, intentionally creating a raised seam to emphasize the construction. It’s a pleasing detail, I think.

I didn’t get any pictures of Rorschach in NYC, as we killed our camera card on our friends’ wedding ceremony and forgot to bring the device to dump the photos onto the laptop. But this afternoon the sun came out, and after I guzzled a mint Dewlep (no bourbon in the house, but some leftover Dewar’s from my grandmother’s memorial party did the trick handily) while cheering Street Sense to his Derby win, I gussied up and made Mr. Garter take pictures of me with my bicicletta. It’s fun to play that you’re in an Anthropologie catalogue. There are some little girls down the street who like to dress up and play Fairy Princesses… this is my interpretation. And Portland is a great location for a photo shoot right now: spring is at full throttle.

Next time I’ll have a report and a few pictures from my New York sojourn. Teaser: Of all the wedding dresses I’ve ever seen, I coveted this one the most.

 Update: Gah, you guys aren’t making this any easier! Such well-reasoned advocacy for both buttons, and people whose taste I admire–nay, covet–on both sides! Even some votes for white buttons, which I hadn’t considered at all. I realized that EZ placed her black buttons on the black stripe, except for the top and bottom buttons, which does something visually different than what I’ve presented here. But my sweater has less ease, so placing them on the white band is more practical. I’m going to have to take both sets on the plane tonight and ask the flight attendants to parade them through the aisles and keep a tally of the responses! Seriously, I think I’ll sew on the small buttons (because I have to have some way to hold the jacket closed for now, but keep the large ones so I can change them if I want. And maybe I’ll look at some white buttons, too. Thank you all for your opinions!
Rorschach is still damp, but I need to act speedily and get some buttons sewn on if I want to take her to New York. And I need your opinions, my friends. Let’s meet the contenders:

Button #1 is the lower, smaller button. It’s shinier, and has a square shape within the circle that pleasingly echoes Rorschach’s mitres.

Button #2 is the larger button. It’s got a geometric design, too, although it doesn’t remind me of any of the sweater’s visual elements. Button #2 is also closer to a matte black.

Now let’s see them in situ:

As always, click for big. The closure in either case is an EZ button tab: a loop of i-cord with both ends hitched to a short tab of garter stitch, attached to the edge of the cardi front. This brings me to a final question: Do you think it matters which side the buttons are on? Is that whole men’s-on-one-side, women’s-on-the-other thing relevant? I can never remember which is which anyway.

Okay, cast your votes!

…And they sure do like an elbow-length sleeve. Thanks to all of you for your thoughtful consideration of the matter — I had a good chuckle over your concern about me revealing my potentially flabby arms in cap sleeves. (I’m glad to be able to allay your fears and say that an active youth of horseback riding, tree climbing, and construction work, as well as skinny-arm genes from my mom, have rendered my limbs fit for exposure. But I’m grateful you’ve all got my back when it comes to averting tasteless fashion decisions!) The point that swayed me, though, was the astute observations by Emily, Karma and Debby that the tweedy nature of the yarn seems better suited to longer sleeves. I hadn’t even thought of that, but I completely agree.

In case you’re wondering how the mods worked out, I offer you a few cruddy self-portraits. Mr. Garter has departed for NYC (I’ll be hot on his heels Friday night, and I can hardly wait to see my New York pals), so I had resort to ye olde mirror shot. With low light on a gray day. Lucky you.

I don’t have the placket stitched down yet, as you can see, and I haven’t attached the hooks and eyes, but I think at least we can see that the modifications were largely successful. The thing is going to close in front, and the waist shaping falls at the right place.

That’s Great-Aunt Priscilla (we have to distinguish, because there were two great-aunts Priscilla: this is the knitting, rug-making, ubercraft Priscilla, as opposed to mountaineering geologist Priscilla) looking over my shoulder. I can’t tell if she approves or not, but she’s always watching. She’s also way cuter than you can tell in these pictures — if only I’d gotten the red-headed-babe gene along with the skinny-arms gene. Mr. Garter would have been so psyched.

Better photos when Glee is really done, I promise. And pssst — look what’s blocking:

Meet Glee, as she exists so far. Little Miss Glee is basically a Big Fat Experiment — the kind where you don’t know whether it’s all going to come together until the last stitches are bound off and the last hook and eye are sewn in place and you can try the thing on. The thing is, this little top looked cute on Carrie and on the pattern envelope. But once I bought my own copy and dug into it, there were some red flags. Crimson flags. Incarnadine flags. Ahem, no waist shaping? Nothing to trim the little madam down after she progresses past my bust? If I were a boobless boy, this might look good. Alas, I am not. Not even alas. I embrace my shapely femininity. (Cue Free to Be You and Me.) But what to do with tube-ish Glee? (Okay, those last few sentences read like Gilbert and Sullivan, had they written any scores while blind drunk. Sorry about that.)

Short rows. Hell-bent-for-leather decreasing. More short rows. More decreasing. Now some increasing, and I’m nearing the end. I took it off the needles once, just after the bust, to see how I was doing. Now it’s hold-your-breath, race-for-the-finish-line knitting, and the mood is one of anxious anticipation rather than glee. There will be glee if the thing fits like I hope it will, but not yet.

I do like this yarn, though. It’s Garnstudio Drops Silke-Tweed, and it makes a nice cohesive, slightly nubbled fabric. More than that, I love the color: indigo with flecks of red, green and white. You can kind of see it here, but it’s better in person.

Okay, I’m off to concoct some sort of costume for Michelle’s Twin Peaks-themed birthday party (Happy Birthday, Michelle!), and then I’m going to spend a little QT with Rorschach, some hot ginger tea, and the BBC Pride and Prejudice, which you can never watch too many times and is unparalleled on rainy afternoons.

But quick, before I go, give me an opinion on Glee’s sleeves: Little cap sleeves as in the pattern (what you see above plus four rounds of 1×1 rib), or elbow-length like Carrie’s? Vote!