I knit each of the hats in this blog post using the same pattern on the same size needles. If you look at them, though, you can tell that they are not the same hat.
What I mean by that is even though it’s the same pattern with the same size needles, the hats are still distinct from each other. That difference is entirely down to the yarn that I used for each of the hats.
Each of these yarns is a bulky yarn. Within that category, though, there are significant differences in terms of thickness.
Even more so, there are differences in yarn construction and fiber content. Let’s take a look at how each of these yarns has behaved under similar circumstances and how its unique characteristics have created different hats. Then we will talk about why this shows the importance of gauge swatching.
Blue Hat
The blue hat that you see here was knit using a bulky Merino wool yarn. The yarn is a superwash Merino, and it is constructed with a two-ply method with a relatively low twist. That means it is lofty and light.
It is also slightly finer than the yarn I used for the original sample. This yarn comes with 100 yards per 100g hank as opposed to the 70 yards per 100g hank used in the original sample.
That slightly finer yarn combined with a different yarn construction has led to a hat that is overall less dense-looking. It is slightly smaller than the original sample and when worn, has a greater amount of space within and between the eyelet stitches.
Clay-Colored Hat
This is the original sample that I knit for this hat back when I first designed it in 2019. Although the dyer had originally labeled the yarn as aran weight, at 70 yards per 100 g, I think this yarn can more fairly be categorized as a bulky or super-bulky yarn. It is a single-ply yarn with a comparatively high twist, which means that it has better stitch definition than many other single-ply yarns, but it’s still going to have less stitch definition than a multi-ply yarn with a high twist.
The original sample of this hat fits my head very comfortably. My head has a 22-inch circumference, which gives you a little bit of a sense of how everything else is going to work here. The hat is dense, comparatively heavy, doesn’t have much drape, and is very warm. It’s genuinely one of my favorite hats.
Pink Hat
The pink version of this hat was knit using Malabrigo Mecha yarn, which is a bulky-weight yarn, but it’s at the finer end of the scale. This yarn has 130 yards per 100 g. It is also a single-ply yarn with slightly lower twist than the yarn I used for the original sample.
And here’s where I have a confession to make. Because I knew this yarn was going to be significantly finer than the original sample, I knit the next size up in this hat. Then I added more repeats before I started the crown so that it wouldn’t be too short. Even with those additional stitches, you can see that this hat is not significantly larger than the original sample.
In other words, if I had not added those stitches, this hat would have been way too small.
Why Gauge Swatching Matters
While you can tell just by looking at the label that some of these yarns will knit up differently from others, you won’t necessarily know *how* differently unless you gauge swatch. The gauge swatch allows you to see not only how many stitches and per inch and stitches per row you get with a given size of needles, but also allows you to see how that fabric behaves.
This also means you need to block your gauge swatch the way you’ll block your finished item. Note: this does not mean stretch out your gauge swatch! It means either soak or steam your swatch the way you plan to clean the finished item, then lay it flat to dry.
For swatches for hats, I always recommend a soak. That’s because our hats come into contact with facial skin oils, scalp oils, skincare products, makeup, hair products, etc. They need to be washed, so wash your swatch, too.
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Great explanation! thank you.
I realize this is late but I also swatch to test how a yarn handles washing and drying according to the wrapper’s instructions.
Learned to do this after knitting a long vest with lots of cables. The wrapper said machine wash cool and low dry. The yarn pilled so badly that an hour later I just threw it in the trash. If only I’d washed the gauge swatch.