Swatching predictively is all about getting your swatch to tell you about the fabric of your future sweater. You’ll get a more accurate idea of how your fabric will look and feel in the end and you can catch any surprises that might pop up when you’re knitting the real thing.
- Make your rows long enough to hit your knitting groove. Most of us unconsciously have different knitting motions when knitting 20 stitches vs. 100 stitches. Cast on enough stitches to knit the way you’ll knit a garment. If you’re unsure where to start with a new yarn, use the ball-band gauge to catch on between 6 – 8” (15 – 20.5 cm).
- Swatch for long enough to ‘get into your groove’. None of us get into our regular knitting motion within the first inch or two, so you should knit your swatch until it’s tall enough to give you good data. You’ll need at least 5” / 12.5 cm, and I recommend between 6 – 8” (15 – 20.5 cm).
- Replicate your normal knitting conditions. Swatching aims to understand how your yarn will behave while you knit the larger garment, so make sure you knit under similar conditions. If you’re the type of person who only knits in the evening watching TV in a specific chair, that’s how you should also knit your swatch!
- Treat your swatch as you will your sweater. However you’ll treat your sweater, treat the swatch. Most people wash and then lay their sweaters flat to dry – so that’s how you should treat your swatch. Then let it dry until it’s really dry. Feel how the fabric moves, rub it, crinkle it, handle it, pet it, and form some opinions.
- Measure the ‘good parts’ of your swatch. You went to so much trouble to get into your knitting motion thoroughly and truthfully – don’t pull your gauge sample from the edges where stitches may be skewed.
- Mark out a known number of stitches and measure between them. The most accurate way to measure gauge is to mark out the maximum number of stitches and rows you think to give you ‘good parts’ and then measure that whole number of stitches. A ruler can help you estimate a fraction of an inch/centimetre; it’s much harder to estimate a fraction of a stitch.
