Hello! I don’t have a straightforward pattern because I improvised a lot. That is how I work in the studio in my ~*fine art practise*~, but as a knitter, nothing fills me with more horror than the idea of wading through a poorly written and entirely untested pattern, so I shan’t inflict such a thing on your mother.
What I will do very happily, though, is share the patterns I used as a template, a sort of recipe, because I also get really annoyed when I see something cool and the maker is like, “oh this old thing? i just made it au pif, tee-hee~”
I shall now address this post to the general You, a Person Who Wants To Make Their Own Pigeon Jumper.
First things first: If you are a beginner, try making a colourwork hat, then some gloves, and then admitting that you love to be stressed while engaged in a relaxing hobby. You are now ready to make a jumper! That is exactly how I progressed.
An actual proper knitting pattern: Turtle Dove by Espace Tricot on Ravelry.
Colour chart (from beginning of yoke, below neck ribbing)
NB: this is a VERY ROUGH GUIDE!!!!!!!!! I didn’t account for increases at all and i also at one point RAN OUT OF GREEN YARN and used blue instead so uhhhhh. This was an approximate visual guide to keep me from being too stripey and blocky with my colours.
Choose your own pigeon colours, swatch and adjust to the pattern, making your own colourwork chart for the yoke. Once the bust has reached an adequate size (a bit of roominess, you do want a nice pigeon chest), rapidly decrease until you reach the natural waist and work some ribbing for a round cropped silhouette (or whatever length you like). Then, if you like, add extra transitional and bright or sparkly shades using duplicate stitch. Particularly important to block this jumper, the colours really sit a lot better together once you do so!
A more detailed description of its making:
I looked very carefully at real pigeons and photos of pigeons, distilling them to a handful of main colours: green, purple, a rich charcoal grey (important transitional colour), and more general pigeon greys. I chose whatever was closest out of the shades available at my LYS in bulky weight (or equivalent, held double). Later, I would discover that the addition of a rich blue was necessary for various reasons.
Then I messed about in Stitch Fiddle, trying to get a slightly scattered effect with the pigeon neck colours. The chart starts from the beginning of the yoke, not the high neck (the high neck is just plain ribbing with duplicate stitch). I really did not bother with accounting for increases; it was simply a visual guide to make sure I wasn’t too regular. The colours are organised in groups of 2 - 4 with the occasional single stitch of colour to keep things spicé.
Cast on in green and work neck ribbing.
Begin colourwork chart, green with charcoal grey.
RUN OUT OF GREEN YARN ALERT ALERT ALERT
o thank god I have rich blue sparkly yarn in my stash!!!!!! continue with this instead until i finally get to purple
Finish colourwork chart and continue yoke increases in main light grey until you have a bit of a roomy bust. TRY IT ON. Put it onto spare yarn/longer needles and please test it out!
Separate sleeves as usual.
Rapidly decrease at each side seam until you reach the natural waist. I think I did something demonic like decreasing by 8 stitches at one point? But also I am VERY short, so you’ll need to consider your torso length.
Ribbing! Work a bit more than you need. Try it on! i was going for a cropped length but again, it’s your pigeon jumper.
Sleeves were worked with extra decreases and colour changes to create that round shape.
If you like to suffer more, get more subtle yarns/embroidery wool in transitional colours (verrry dark rich bluey-greens, greyish lavenders, pinkish mauves) and add some duplicate stitches.
More suffering can be had if you also embroider some iridescent lurex and metallic threads on there, too. This jumper is a little sparkly in real life.
Once blocked and dried, wear it and meet some pigeons.
That’s all! You have now made jumper that is about your own relationship to pigeons.
