During a reenactment show in the Historical Openair Museum Eindhoven I found a very beautifull grey sweater made in sprang. The sweater had been made in different parts that later had been sown together (The sleeves, the body and collar).
I had never considered the posibility of making bigger project and modern aplications like pieces of clothing were a option in this technique. Until then I had made band, bags and a few caps. Did I dare to take on this project?

Fenny Nijman

In the book “Sprang, egyptisch vlechten” by Fenny Nijman there is a patern for a sweater.
This sweater is made as one piece instead of seperate pieces that are then sown together. Not only did this seem easier but without seems also prettier. I decided to take this sweater as my startingpoint.

The pattern

The basicpatern for this sweater is a rectanglar plane With an opening in the middle. By attaching two extra lines the sleeves can be braided on to the with the body as one piece.
I decided to make a sleeveless sweater and use the elasticity of the technique to create bat-like sleeves.
When the braiding is finished. the whole thing is folded and the sides are sown together, leaving an opening at the top on both sides for the arms.

No sleeves

On this picture you can see that the sweater is indeed sleeveless. The elasticity of the braiding alows the shoulders to strech and form a sleeve.
The opening for the arms is about 15 centimeters (6 inch)

Neckline

At about 3/4 of the braiding I splitt the plane in two separate planes to make an opening for your head. This is very simple to do by lifting 2 threads and then dropping 2 treats precisely in the middle of the plane. The next row You close 1 by 1 and the third row you again lift 2 and drop 2.

Pattern

When I made this sweater I (for the first time) felt comfortable enough to try making a patern of little holes in the sweater.

Holes

At the bottom of the sweater I started making a hole after every 8 threads, the part in the middle has a hole after every 4 threads and the top after every 2 threads.

Endresult

And this is what the endresult looks like. The sweater was made out of 100% wool and is dispite of it is very open braiding quite warm. It is a sweater that you can ‘live’ in.

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• A sweater made by Carol James