Way back when we visited Italy, I grabbed a very cheap, black synthetic jumper at one of those ubiquitous street-side-market-stall-vendors. It was a simple, baggy, vee-necked design with a large cable in front. Totally synthetic and branded “made in china”, it has seen countless wearings by me and now Bessie (truly that girly is the recipient of several wardrobes worth of clothing cast-offs from Joan and I).

Recently I noticed that the pauvre €5 jumper was looking much the worse for wear, so I was forced to take a crochet hook and glass of wine to it and pick up the many (many) unravelled stitches. I felt rather like the super-excellent tomofholland in my mending endeavours.

I felt the repairs could only eke out the life for so long, so thought it might be a Fine Idea to craft a replacement and began the search (and search) for patterns. The best one I found was in this book and I duly acquired it on Abebooks.

When it arrived I was comforted to discover that desired jumper looked as expected, lo:

But otherwise the book was full of really rather confronting (unkind people might refer to them as perfectly hideous) garments made from various combinations of rather confronting synthetic yarn. And indeed, though it does not look it, desired jumper was made from a combination of yarn, twisted together.

Nonetheless, I acquired some Giant cheapo bamboo needles and a variety of inexpensive, synthetic yarns for testing and have added swatching to the Action Items List for the weekend.

Ceiling BabyKitty approves.