The Knitting Fiend

Q: Does row gauge matter? Correct answer: Sometimes.

The issue of row gauge reared its ugly head on the knitlist recently. As knitters know, they need to match the stitch gauge or the sweater circumference will be too large or too small. However, from time to time, the knitter knits their swatch, matches the intended stitch gauge, but finds the if row gauge is off. Prudent knitters want to know whether or not this matters before they cast on and knit a sweater that either doesn’t fit or fits but doesn’t look as intended.

One such prudent knitter asked at the knit list; a poll was conducted. On Friday June 17, the result of the informal poll was reported:

I have gotten quite a lot of answers. They seem to fall into two camps. Those who think that it is extremely important and who think anyone who does not make sure they know both is headed for trouble. And those who think that only stitch gauge matters and think it is good enough to just measure the length.

It is not quite 50/50 but there are no folks in the middle, it seems. One opinion or the other pretty firmly presented.

No folks in the middle? Yikes!

Both “absolutely yes” and “absolutely no” are incorrect. The problem with informal polls taken on the knitlist is, when the correct answer is “sometimes, you only get responses from people who haven’t thought about the problem thoroughly. Those who have thought it through don’t respond because the correct response requires and explanation!

Fortunately, after the poll results were presented Jaya posted an answer which was as correct as possible and complete as possible to provide on an email list that does not permit illustrations.

Here at my blog, I’ll expand on her answer, including an illustration to highlight some points. And guess what? It’s going to be a series!

This article one covers how row gauge affects fit. The next will discuss how to fix the problem assuming you can’t adjust your row gauge. Then, I’ll move on the aesthetic issues unrelated to fit.

There is a fourth thing that can matter: not getting the correct row gauge can affect the amount of yarn required. I’m not going to discuss yarn use in detail; suffice it to say, if your stitch gauge matches but your row gauge does not, you may use a different amount of yarn than suggested by the designer. ¹

On to fit!

Let’s start by examining the two proto-sleeves illustrated at the top of the page and also directly to the left.² The sleeve on the right shows the dimensions “as designed”. The sleeve on the right shows the dimensions “as knit” by a competent hand knitter who follows the pattern directions, achieves the correct stitch gauge but knits “short” stitches — that is, they get too many rows/inch.

Ok. Let’s see what happens.

First, the knitter casts on the number of stitches required for the cuff width; that’s the width at the bottom of either illustration. The typical set of instructions might say this:

1. Work 10 rows.
2. *Increase 1 stitch at each end at the beginning of the next row, work 9 more rows; repeat from * 4 times.
3. Work even until length measures 15″ from cast on.

So, as the piece lengths, it widens out as illustrated in both the left and right illustration.

Now examine both figures. The green line indicates the length of the piece the knitter would achieve after finishing step #2 in the instructions provided above; the blue line illustrates the length after finishing step #3. Notice the green line on the right “as designed” sleeve is longer than that on the left “as knit” sleeve.

What happened? In both the “as design” and “as knit” working step 2, the knitter has completed 60 rows. Because the knitter’s knits “short” rows, the “as knit sleeve”, this bit of knitting is shorter than intended. However, the instructions tell you to continue knitting until the work measures 15″; following the directions, the knitter knits until the sleeve is the length shown by the blue lines.

Notice that the “as knit” sweater has to knit extra rows to make up for the short length of the shaped part of the lower sleeve; I illustrated this length with a grey hatched area.

Now, recall, some people who posted at the knit lists said the only thing that matters is the length? Well, they are probably thinking of fit issues only, and also assuming your row gauge is not too far out of whack.

If the “as knit” row gauge is only a bit off from the “as designed” row gauge, the two sleeves will be very similar. As a general rule, the length I illustrated in blue dictates the length from the underarm to the hem. That is generally much more important than the precise length where the sleeve reaches it’s maximum width, as marked in green. You do want to match the length marked in blue; that’s one of the reasons typical hand knitting patterns say ‘knit until length is 15″ ‘.

But, what if your row gauge is way off? Say the designer intended you to get 5 rows/inch and you got 10 rows/inch?³ Then, the sleeve will achieve its full width somewhere below your elbow! The excess width near your elbow may look sloppy and you’ll probably be unhappy with the final appearance.

In that case, you would want to rip back, recalculate the taper, and start over. But, I’m not going to discuss recalculating here; that’s for another article.

Now, consider this: Suppose the “as knit” gauge is taller than the “as designed” gauge? (That is, you get too few rows/inch). I didn’t illustrate that, but in that case, the green arrow on the left would be longer than on the right. Well, once again, if the row gauge is just a little off, that’s ok. You just continue knitting until the length matches that shown in blue.

There is a potential major problem: What if you finish step #2 and discover the sleeve is already too long to follow direction #3? That is, the green arrow becomes longer than the blue one? Well, you’ll have two choices: a) either you need to rip back some length, recalculate the taper and knit the piece over or b) you can cope with sleeves that are too long. Luckily, because designers are kind and use some nifty tricks, you probably won’t have this problem unless your row gauge is way off. Obviously if this happened to you and if you absolutely hate over long sleeves, you will become convinced that row gauge matters!

Now, let’s consider the the sleeve cap. Examine the proto-sleeve illustration. The upper portion is the “proto-cap”, which shows regular decreases to narrow the width; in the sketch the proportions resemble a “fully fashioned” sleeve cap rather than, say, raglan sleeve cap, but I’ll discuss both.

A typical set of instructions for a very simple sleeve cap might say:

1. Decrease 1 stitch at beginning of row 24 times.
2. Bind off all stitches

This instruction will cause the cap to decrease rapidly. For a fully fashioned sleeve (which looks more or less fitted), you will typically find you decrease until 1/2 to 1/3 of the original number of stitches remain; for a raglan, you may decrease until only 2 stitches are left. What’s similar in both cases is this: if your rows are short, the cap will be shorter than intended. This is illustrated with the red lines shown on both the “as knit” and “as designed” sleeve.

Considering only fit, is this a problem? Well, there are three potential problems. Two can be noticeable, and often affect raglan sleeves. The other one is less likely to be noticeable. I’ll begin with the unimportant one, making it sound way more horrible than they are ever likely to be!

First, if this is a fully fashioned sleeve cap you’re going to need to pin that sleeve cap to into the sleeve. If the cap were much short you’d have a difficult time sewing it to the armhole! To manage, you’d have to stretch the cap while sewing; later the cap would spring back to it’s unstretched length and gather up the armhole on the body of the sweater. If the gathering were severe, this would look ugly and the armhole would be shallower than intended. Shallow armholes can be very uncomfortable!

I know that sounds horrid, but as a practical matter, because the fully fashioned sleeve cap is fairly short, your row gauge would need to be quite a bit off for this to be a noticeable problem. When it does happen, you can fix the problem fairly easily. I’ll explain in a follow on article, but don’t worry about this problem.

Now, for the second problem, which affects raglan sleeve. In the case of a raglan, the sleeve cap depth is the armhole depth. So, if it’s short, that means the armholes will be shallower than the designer intended. They’ll bind. If you’re like me, if you don’t you’d rip back and rework both the sleeves and the body you will never wear the sweater. Never!

Now, for the third fit issue: If the cap is too short, the total knitted sleeve length will be shorter than intended by the designer. This means that if the design sleeve length was appropriate for your arms, the sleeves will end up a bit too short. This problem can be very noticeable with raglan sleeves; fixing requires ripping back and reworking the sleeve caps and the body of the sweater!

That said, when the raglan sleeves are too short because the caps are too short, you’ll also usually discover the armholes are also too tight! Moreover, when you solve the tight armholes, you’ll automatically lengthen the sleeves. So, they are actually the same problem! ⁴

Ok. So, you came here because you aren’t matching the row gauge, and you wondered if it matters. As far as fit is concerned, the general answer is: sometimes. Let’s say you’ve read the article and figured out it affects your sweater. What should you do about it? I’ll answer sometime in the next few days.

Ciao for now!

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1. Specifically, if your row gauge has more rows per inch, (that is, your rows are “short”) then you will use more yarn. Otherwise, you will use less yarn.

2. I call it a proto-sleeve because the illustration includes only those elements important to this discussion. I would never knit a sleeve this shape, but I have seen patterns with sleeves like these.

3. This gauge mismatch probably won’t happen. Generally, your row gauge won’t be way off unless you substitute a dramatically different stitch pattern (e.g. a slip stitch pattern instead of stockinette), or use a completely different type of yarn, (e.g. ribbon for worsted yarn.)

4. By the way, if you don’t understand why the sleeves might end up to short, read my blog article on knitted sleeve lengths.