Although it’s on my list, I have yet to see “Knives Out,” but as you may have heard there’s A Sweater — and the internet has gone mad for it. I don’t just mean the knitters. If you google “knives out sweater” you will see a remarkable number of search results for a big-screen sweater. And given how many inquiries I’ve gotten about fisherman sweaters generally since the Rambler satchel listing went up, it seemed like a good time to address this perennially pressing topic. (You know I am always happy to talk about fisherman sweaters!) Actually, based on the trailer, it appears there are a whole lot of cable sweaters in that movie, but let’s talk about this ivory fisherman on actor Chris Evans, above. With apologies to Jamie Lee Curtis.

To knit an equivalent, your best bet is probably Alice Starmore’s famous Na Craga* — just give it a ribbed crewneck to hew closer to the movie sweater, instead of the decorative funnel neck. And for yarn I’m going to suggest Scout in natural from my friends at Kelbourne Woolens because it’s the classic wool yarn I’m most eager to knit with right now! You could also try the free pattern from Drops called 59-6, same neckband note. And a great raglan alternative would be Strandhus by Veta Romanenkova, which includes both men’s and women’s options.

For those wondering about my fisherman sweater in the Rambler photo(s) (and the Porter before it), it’s a 10-year-old LL Bean. My all-time favorite fisherman sweater pattern is the vintage Bernat 536-145, which I knitted a couple years ago. It’s out of print but the 1967 booklet it’s in, The Bernat Book of Irish Knits, is not hard to come by if you search the Internet, and is a treasure trove of patterns. But even closer to the LL Bean one is the free Honeycomb Aran pattern by Patons.

Whatever you do, if you should knit yourself a glorious, richly cabled sweater, I hope that you will love it and wear it to tatters, and that every hard-earned worn spot will speak to that love and respect and longevity. As opposed to the fake wear-and-tear imposed on the movie sweater by costume designer Jenny Eagan (who can’t even remember who made it?!), who did it to convey that the spoiled-brat character, Ransom, “didn’t take care of it … the holes and the tatter gave him a touch of that disrespect. It was a disrespect to the family, a disrespect to the name, a disrespect to his clothes.” I don’t think the knitters in the audience will read it as anything other than that Ransom loved his sweater as much as the Internet does.

For more, see:
• Aran sweater legends
• Best fisherman sweater patterns
• Cable sweater amazement of the 1960s-80s
• Quest for the perfect aran sweater
• and the Amanda knitalong

*The one pictured in the lower left above was knitted by webgoddess on Ravelry

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PREVIOUSLY in Knit the Look: Mister Rogers’ Smithsonian cardigan

Arguably one of the most famous sweaters in American history — if not the most famous — is Mister Rogers’ red cardigan, which he wore on countless episodes of his legendary TV show and at least once to meet an American president, and which is now in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian. As a knitter, you probably know that his mother knitted all of his cardigans for as long as she was able, and you may be wondering if the sweaters Tom Hanks wears in the movie are also handknits. They were, and here’s the knitter who knitted them. And if you’d like to knit one for yourself or some kindly person in your life, there’s a free pattern.

The sample is knitted in Brooklyn Tweed Shelter in Cinnabar, but it’s possible you could knit it in another color and not have people make Mister Rogers references everywhere you go. There are also those great vintage Mary Maxim patterns if you want something in the same vein but a little less on the nose.

I feel like I should acknowledge that as a small child I lived for Sesame Street and found Mister Rogers unbearable. But I do love the knitting angle.

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PREVIOUSLY in Knit the Look: the “Love, Actually” cardigan

Sunday afternoon, while forced to exercise indoors (rather than be out on the greenway where I belong!) I was also forced (or so I’ll claim) to rewatch “Love, Actually” while I did it. The high point is definitely the moment just past the 46-minute mark when a shawl-collar cable cardigan joins the ensemble cast. Worn by Aurelia, the Portuguese maid in my favorite of the storylines, it’s a deceptively simple little sweater. Chunky. Heather grey. Little patch pockets on the front. A single toggle closure. And it’s pure stockinette, including the shawl collar itself, except for the presence of some … cables. I don’t know if there’s a proper name for this sort of cable, but in my head I call them stockinette cables, which is an oxymoron but still feels accurate to me. You’re just knitting stockinette and suddenly decide to cross a large number of stitches — like 8 or more. There are no purl stitches to set them off or anything, they’re just like waves in the stockinette. On this sweater, there’s one running up each side of the front and back, and up the center of each sleeve.

To emulate it, you could use Lion Brand’s free Autumn Afternoons cardigan pattern, which has all the basic traits including the integral stockinette shawl collar. The key difference is that this collar has a facing, so it winds up being a double thickness. To make the collar more like Aurelia’s, you could omit the facing stitches (clearly described by the schematic) and either slip the edge stitches or work an I-cord edge.

Apart from that and some 1×1 ribbing at the hem and cuffs, all you’d need to add is the pockets, the toggle closure, and the cables. For the latter, you’d want to swatch and see what such a big cable would do to the gauge, and adjust your stitch count to compensate. Since the sweater is worked flat in pieces, it would be quite simple to experiment with one of the fronts to get those details sorted out!

The recommended yarn for the pattern is listed as aran weight, but it’s knitted on US 10.5 needles at 3.5 stitches per inch. Sound familiar? Lopi would be a beautiful choice, although I’ve never attempted to cable with it. (Even “stockinette cables”!) I’d try something like Harrisville’s Turbine. Which I just realized I also recommended in the last Knit the Look! Clearly I have this yarn on the brain — might need to get it onto the needles.

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PREVIOUSLY in Knit the Look: the mini Guernsey Literary Society henley

If you’ve seen the Netflix adaptation of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (which is not quite as twee as the title suggests), you know it’s chock full of sweaters. No ganseys, oddly, given that it’s set on Guernsey, and it’s a little confusing whose sweaters look possibly handknit and whose definitely don’t, but we’ll leave that aside. The point is: sweaters! The thrust of the story is that a pretty young London writer visits a group of book-loving strangers on the isle of Guernsey, which is still reeling from the Nazi occupation. She is a first-rate packer. Although she’s meant to be there a night or two, her mix-and-match travel wardrobe carries her through a longer stay: tweed trousers and skirt, three or four pretty silk blouses with big collars, two sweater vests, a pullover with a little Peter Pan collar, a pretty great blue-marl cardigan, a brown suede jacket and a brown garter-stitch beret are all she needs, with just a pair of borrowed workpants for when she’s helping her unanticipated love interest with his pigs. (Oh, surely you can see that coming!) For my money, though, the kids and the men get all the best sweaters. Best of all being the tattered henley pictured on the little girl, Kit, above.

There are weirdly few images from the movie on the internet, and they’re all of the woven garments, despite the fact that every single character except the military fiancé wears multiple sweaters in the film. I mean, too many cardigans to even begin to count. (There may be more Knit the Looks about these.) But that’s why all I have for you is an iPhone photo of my laptop screen, and you’ll have to trust my eye and memory on the rest.

So about this little pullover, which obviously I want in my size and minus the post-occupation tatters: It’s just a mushroom colored, boxy little henley but what makes it interesting, as always, are the details. The sleeves are ribbed but it appears to be garter rib, which would be less bunchy to wear and also features strongly on a few other of the movie’s sweaters. There are two little chest pockets also in rib. (It makes me think of Marshal, in some ways.) But what really seals it is that henley placket that runs right down to the waist ribbing. To emulate it, you could use the free ’80s-era pattern from Drops known poetically as 4-24. Knit the sleeves in garter rib and fashion a couple of chest patch pockets to match, and instead of working the placket opening a few inches shy of the neck, start it just above the waist ribbing. (And refrain from inserting shoulder pads as Drops appears to have done!) The pattern is written for bulky, so I’m recommending Harrisville’s lovely tweedy Turbine yarn in Driftwood, but it would also be easy to adapt that pattern to a lighter gauge.

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PREVIOUSLY in Knit the Look: The Crown’s cardigans

I’ve heard it said that Neflix’s spectacular “The Crown” has the biggest budget of any TV series in history, and it’s easy to believe — the sheer number of extras, sets, locations, costumes. It often seems you’ve seen an entire movie’s worth of people and outfits before the opening credits begin.  And gosh, the young Queen Elizabeth’s cardigans alone — a truly dizzying array of them (pink, black, peacock, khaki …) — must have cost a pretty penny! It leaves me wondering whether she really spent nearly every day of her life in one, and how many there were in her royal closet. (Just a few on repeat? She seems so sensible.) But if it leaves you wondering how to knit a similar one for yourself, I’d recommend Churchmouse’s Quintessential Cardigan pattern, which is written for lace-weight yarn held double and knitted on 5s for a nice light fabric (though not as ultra-fine-gauge as the machine-knit costume ones), and which also includes details on how to customize the length of both the body and sleeves. One of the recommended yarns is Rowan’s Kidsilk Haze, and while I don’t think I’ve seen the Queen wear a mohair sweater, it was certainly all the rage in the ’50s. Kidsilk Haze comes in several of the show’s colors, including “Drab,” which looks about like the one she’s wearing above. The other recommended yarn is Shibui’s Lunar (pictured), a luxurious merino-silk blend that might suit Her Majesty. Or of course, there’s always cashmere.

Does anyone here know, seriously, what the Queen might have preferred?

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PREVIOUSLY in Knit the Look: Marthe Wiggers’ vintage-chic pullover