So it's now time for us to move onto the body of the Laminarus cardigan. This is works from the top down, you'll start by joining both fronts with the back by adding underarm stitches. This makes it a great place to tweak the sizing a little if you need to, adding more or less stitches.
Next will will work in stockinette stitch to just below the fullest bust point. If you're new to top down knitting the easiest way to check you length is by slipping half of your stitches onto a second needle so that you can stretch them out. This will allow you to try the cardigan on easily without having your stitches pop off the needle! (And yes, I've done this before......)
Now if you're happy with the length you can move onto the waist shaping. If your bust size is lower or higher you can adjust where you begin your shaping to suit your own body. You can also opt to change the type of shaping now as well. The pattern is written with a-line shaping, slowly increasing as you go down the body length. However I've give the option of adding a more fitted shape by first decreasing stitches towards the waist and then increasing below the waist. Or even if you would prefer working no body shaping at all.
Once you've worked a little further you will now begin to introduce the double garter stitch pattern and then the cables. Initially with the cables you will have 4 mirrored and then after one increase you will add 4 more cables. You can see how the cables are mirrored on each side of the body. If you want to move the position of the cables around you can also easily do that by moving the stitch markers to a different location.
Have fun knitting the body of the Laminarus, those 2 colour cables are VERY addictive!
