Yggdrasil Pullover

The largest tree in the world.  The three roots twisting into realms and the branches reaching above the sky. It stands between the nine worlds to hold it together.

Today I want to introduce Yggdrasil Pullover to you! This is the first ever sweater pattern that I designed and graded into different sizes. The learning curve was ~ steep ~ with this one, and I’m so grateful for having the courage to do it at the time. I worked at a yarn shop in Gothenburg, “Broderi & Garn” at the time and I got so much amazing support from my co-workers. They truly helped me get over the feeling of imposter syndrome.

The name Yggdrasil

When I started my knitwear design journey I knew I wanted to include my love for mythology and fantasy in some way. I didn’t want to design “merch” knitwear but I wanted to have it in my concept somehow. Naming my patterns after different mythology items, godessess, characters and spieces made sense! And there’s a lot of names to choose from! The name Yggdrasil came to me quite early in the process and it felt suitable because the yarn I choose was green and the detail is a braid going through the raglan increases and down the side of the body. And as you may know, Yggdrasil is the largest tree in the norse myth and it’s roots goes down in the realms.

The yarn choice

As I said, I worked in a yarn shop at the time and I just really wanted to knit something in the lovely yarn “Svensk Ull” from Järbo that released the year before. I love to support and raise awarness of swedish wool fibers and it felt really good to use it in my first ever sweater pattern. The yarn is a bit rustic so I wanted for it to be very easily adapted to other yarns and the gauge is 18 st on 4.0 mm needles which equals at a DK yarn weight. We had Peruvian Highland Wool in the shop as well and that yarn is known for being very soft, and the gauge is also 18 st.
The color is beautiful, a deep green color that I always gets compliments for when wearing it. There’s a few other colors in the palette that I love as well, but this is my favorite. It’s called Pine Tree Green - also very fitting the name!

The construction

This is a seamless, top down sweater with raglan increases. In between the raglan increases you make a braid containing of 4 st and it travels down to the sides of the sweater and goes into the body ribb. You work short rows in the back to make the fit better and it’s a cropped design. When you part for the sleeves you knit the sleeves with decreases and then work the body. No seaming at all!

The cropped design element is my “thing”. I have always cropped sweaters when making them to fit better to my high waisted skirts and dresses, and I saw a gap in the knitwear world that I wanted to fill!

The process

I remember that I didn’t start this sweater thinking it would become a pattern. I think I was to intimidated by grading and the testknitting part to even think about it. But as I knit it up I got a lot of questions about it online and in the shop, so I just went for it when it was finished. I researched online about grading knitwear patterns. Then I started writing the pattern in a google document and on the way I was! The most scary part was definitely asking on social media for test knitters! I thought no one would like to test it! But I was wrong and soon the testknitting was started.

The best thing about test knitting is that you get a lot of help and as I never written a pattern before, I needed a lot of help. The testers was really kind and helped mw with a lot of stuff and I’m super proud of that pattern! It’s also translated to swedish and german.

Difficulty level

This is not a difficult pattern. The thing that can challenge you a bit it the braid in the raglan. But it’s 2 rows that you repeat again and again, so it’s easy to learn. As it’s knit top down it’s easy to try on while knitting it to make it perfect for you!

A good pattern for a beginner who made some things and have their knit and purl stitches under controll :)

Thank you for reading this post! I hope you enjoyed knowing more about my first ever sweater pattern Yggdrasil.

You’ll find it here on my ravelry: Yggdrasil Pullover

Or here on my website: Yggdrasil Pullover

Have a woolly day, and happy knitting!
Love, Anna.