Vintage 40's Jumpers

While I really have a love of dresses made in the 50’s, I also have a love of sweaters from the 40’s.

I’m not sure what it is but 1940’s dresses, skirts, and blouses don’t behave well on my pear-shaped frame. But the knitted and crocheted sweaters… they’re absolutely perfect. Go figure.

For the Colette Spring Palette Challenge, I’m undertaking my first 40’s knitted jumper, which I’m making in a dove grey to go with my hot-pink/dove-grey/B&W scheme.

It was hard to narrow down to just one pattern because I love them all. But here’s the one I actually settled on, Weldon’s Caledonia jumper:

This image I got from my knitting/crochet website: Ravelry. There isn’t a pattern posted on Ravelry for this jumper, instead I bought it through Iva Rose, who reproduces the original pattern magazines. If you click on the image above, it will take you to the magazine on Iva Rose’s website.

I thought this jumper would be perfect in my spring wardrobe. To me, this jumper looks so classic with all of the best design elements: contour waist line, buttons, and bows.

These little jumpers can take at least one month to make, if not more, since the thread is so fine and the knitting needles are so small. My goal is 16 rows a day, which doesn’t sound all that bad. But its about 1-2 hours of work every day. Luckily, I can knock out 6 rows if I’m able to knit on the train to-and-from work each day. Which leaves me with 10 rows to complete either on my lunch break or in the evening. So far I’m on target, and as a result I’m about 1/2 way done with the back of the jumper since starting on Sunday night.

Here’s my progress after one week and 2 days:

I can’t believe how much it’s grown in size. But the hard part is yet to come since the front of the jumper is a lot more complex than the back.

But, this post wouldn’t be complete if I didn’t show you all of the other lovely jumpers that are out there, just begging to get made.

(Click on any of the images for the patterns and/or sources.)

This one is screams rockabilly with the blue swallows and the red accessories. Isn’t she so pretty?!

This sweater has been in my queue for a while; it’s the famous bow-knot sweater by Elsa Schiaparelli. I would have made mine in short sleeves for springtime, but I think it’s probably best for a fall project since I’d want to do mine in b&w also.

I love this pretty lace yolk blouse with slighly puffled sleeves. It’s a bit hard to see the detail on this small version. But if you have a Ravelry account, here’s a cute mint-green version.