You might have heard the advice to “knit a size smaller” if your gauge is looser than the pattern calls for, or a size larger if your gauge is tighter. And that might just work! Then again, if you’re going to put all that time and yarn into knitting a sweater, you probably want a little more certainty that it’s going to turn out to be the size you’re hoping for.
My friend Christina (christinatina on Ravelry) has a neat method for using the Test My Gauge option in Knittrick to choose which size to knit from a multisize pattern when her gauge doesn’t match the designer’s specification. She was kind enough to explain it by talking me through the process for her beautiful (and perfectly sized!) Ursa sweater project on Ravelry.
©christinatina 2020. Used with permission.
She started out by swatching with her yarn on the size 11.5 (6.5mm) needles that the pattern calls for, but got a gauge of 16 stitches per 4”/10cm, rather than the 11.5 stitches the pattern expects. “I plugged those numbers into Knittrick and I could see right away that the sweater would be 10” smaller than I wanted!”
Initial Sanity Check
How much of a difference will this gauge really make? Well, -9.78”… Nearly 10” too small… it would fit some lucky 6 year old!
Christina was able to get the pattern gauge using size 13 needles (9mm), but as she noted in her Ravelry project, “I don’t like the fabric of the 13 needle, so I’m going to knit the size 46 sweater on size 10.5 needles.” But how did she know the size 46 was the right one for her? “That’s three entire sizes larger than I would normally knit for myself, I never would have picked that size without Knittrick giving me the numbers.”
“I do this all the time now. I look through the pattern for places where it says something like, ‘You should now have (150, 160, 170) stitches on the needles,’ places like the cast on, or after bust increases. And then I just type those numbers into Knittrick and pick the size that comes closest to the right measurement.”
Testing Sizes
Find a good spot in the pattern, like the cast on or the bust, where the designer tells you how many stitches should be on the needles for each size. Plug in the stitch count for each size until you find one where the
You can see this method in action above*. After entering your gauge and the pattern’s gauge at the top of the screen, the calculation area will appear. In the left hand column, start by entering the stitch count for the pattern size you would normally knit if your gauge was spot on. Knittrick fills in the rest of the line, telling you that the pattern expects your knitting at that place to measure 34.78” across, but with your gauge, it’s going to end up being only 25”, or 9.78” smaller.
Now, enter stitch counts for other sizes from that same place in the pattern. On these rows, ignore the “Pattern Intends” and “Difference” numbers. Look just at the “Instead, I will Get” column. When the measurement in that column is close to the “Pattern Intends” measurement of the first row, you’ve found the size you should knit! Make a note of it on your pattern and follow those instructions throughout.
NOTE: If the pattern ever gives instructions like “knit until the body measures (10, 10.5, 11) inches”, use the measurement from the size you would have knitted with perfect gauge. You want to match the finished measurements of that size, so there’s no need to worry about stitch or row count in places where the pattern is giving direct measurements.
NOTE ABOUT YARDAGE: Changing the gauge will change the amount of yarn you need for the project. If you are knitting with a larger, looser gauge than the pattern expects (and knitting a smaller size of the pattern to make up for it), you will need less yarn than the pattern says. If you are knitting with a smaller, tighter gauge and following a larger size of the pattern to make up for it, you will need more yarn. For instance, the Ursa pattern says it requires 450 yards (411 m) for the smallest size, but Christina’s version knitted at a tighter gauge ended up using 574 yards (525m).
*These numbers are for illustration purposes only, they are not the actual numbers from the Ursa pattern by Jaqueline Cieslak.