Well, Jeri, that is a very good question, and one which I had asked myself--and why doesn't Maple Seed swirl in the opposite direction, since it uses left-slanting decreases (SSKs) instead of right-slanting decreases (k2tog)?
The stitch pattern for Beaufort originally caught my attention because it was so similar to one segment of Chinese Lace, and I had even MORE questions about the latter. Why do the first two segments, rows 1-4 and 5-8 on the chart, slant to the left, even though the
YOs slant to the right, and the decreases slant both left and right? Why are the third and sixth segments,
rows 9-12 and 21-24, essentially vertical, in spite of slanting YOs and decreases slanting both left and right? And why do the remaining segments, rows 13-16 and 17-20, slant to the right, even though the YOs slant to the left? Is it the proximity of YOs and decreases?
Well, I must admit that the main conclusion I had drawn from Chinese Lace was that the direction of decreases and the position of YOs does not always determine the slant of a stitch pattern--or lack thereof. And this was confirmed by my experience with Beaufort and Maple Seed.
But to return to Jeri's question, there are two different kinds of swirls going on in these hats: one is the spiral at the crown, and the other is the diagonal that the stitch pattern creates, which would exist even if the knit fabric was flat.
First, why does the stitch pattern spiral at the crown? I had noticed the same phenomenon in Grumperina's Odessa hat pattern. I know that I did nothing in the way of decreases to create the spiral at Beaufort's crown; in fact, I reworked those decreases a number of times, not only to create the most consistently decreasing shapes within the knit columns, but also to keep the natural spiral as smooth as possible.
We've already noted that Beaufort's stitch pattern moves at an angle from the bottom edge--which is a circle, since it's a hat. If you picture a hat as a series of concentric circles, and the line crossing the circles at left shows the angle of B's stitch pattern, you can see that as the circles get smaller, and the line continues to cross each one at the SAME angle as the first, it begins to curve in a spiral.
As for what causes that angle, if you look closely at the photo of Beaufort, you can see that the decreases for each 4-row pattern repeat form the shape of a triangle, (I'll call these the "decrease triangles", colored gray in the above diagram), while the corresponding YOs form--roughly-- an upside-down triangle that fits next to the first (white in the diagram; the purled areas are represented by the squiggly lines). Thus begins the Beaufort swirl, but what causes it to continue is that the left lower corner of each subsequent decrease triangle sits on the apex of the decrease triangle below, forming a diagonal line.
Clear? Unclear? Agree? Disagree? The floor is open for discussion.
ummm ... I'm not sure I understand all this. I understand the swirl at the crown, during the decreases better. And your beaufort decreases are so elegant the way they continue the pattern up, as far as they can.
It's the swirl before the decreases that fascinates me more. And it does swirl so well.
Posted by: Jeri | July 29, 2006 at 04:57 PM