Ainur Berkimbayeva For Purl Soho: Air Mail Vest
The overlapping lines of Ainur Berkimbayeva’s Air Mail Vest remind us of the rare letter received in the post, the folds and contours of the envelope itself, as well as the excitement of discovering thoughts put into shape. We always love to see what’s on Ainur’s mind!
The Air Mail Vest is a wonderful knit that combines an open, relaxed fit with crisp design details, including tidy decreases and an elegant twisted rib stitch pattern.
To make this vest, you knit identical front and back pieces from the bottom up and join them at the shoulders. You then overlap the sloping edges of the two pieces, knitting them together as you complete the hem in the round.
The lovely drape of this piece comes from our wondrously soft Season Alpaca, a 100% super baby alpaca yarn of the most special grade of alpaca available. It is Fair Trade Certified and comes in twenty-two beautiful colors, including gentle River Pink and soft Dove Gray, which we used here. Thank you, Ainur, for this very special delivery!
Yarn lovers, if you adore the yarn used in this project, you’ll love exploring all of our other yarn collections! Discover over 45 thoughtfully designed yarns in nearly every natural fiber and in every spectacular color you can imagine. Only available here at Purl Soho’s online yarn store, where every skein is created with care and your creativity in mind!
Designed for Purl Soho by Ainur Berkimbayeva.
Share your progress and connect with the community by tagging your pics with #PurlSoho, #PurlSohoBusyHands, #PurlSohoAirMailVest and #PurlSohoSeasonAlpaca. We can’t wait to see what you make!
Materials
- 4 (4, 5, 6) (6, 7, 8) (8, 9, 9) skeins of Purl Soho’s Season Alpaca, 100% super baby alpaca yarn. Each skein of this sport weight yarn is approximately 218 yards/ 100 grams; approximately 775 (870, 955, 1190) (1290, 1450, 1600) (1660, 1825, 2060) yards required. We used the colors River Pink and Dove Gray (NOTE: River Pink is no longer available.)
- Two US 3 (3.25 mm), 32-inch circular needles
- US 3, 16-inch circular needles
- US D (3.25mm) crochet hook for Provisional Cast-On
- Scrap yarn for Provisional Cast-On
- A stitch marker
- Stitch holders or scrap yarn
- An Air Mail Vest Pattern
GAUGE
35 stitches and 31 rows = 4 inches in Twisted Rib stitch (see Special Instructions)
SIZES
Note: The vest is open at the sides, making plenty of room for the chest. Choose your size based on hip measurement.
36 (39¼, 42½, 45¾) (49, 52, 55¼) (58½, 61¾, 65)
To fit actual hip circumferences of 34-38 (37-41, 40½-44½, 44-48) (47-51, 50-54, 53-57) (56½-60½, 60-64, 63-67) inches with approximately negative 2 inches to positive 2 inches of ease
- Finished Hip Circumference: 36 (39¼, 42½, 45¾) (49, 52, 55¼) (58½, 61¾, 65)) inches
- Finished Length from Shoulder to Bottom Edge: 21 (21¾, 22, 23¼) (23½, 24¾, 26) (25½, 26½, 27¾) inches
Samples: The Dove Gray vest is size 39¼ and the River Pink vest is size 49, worn with 1½ inches of positive ease.
Pattern
The Air Mail Vest is available for purchase as a PDF download only.
LEARN ABOUT SEASON ALPACA + ALL OUR BEAUTIFUL YARNS
Season Alpaca always brings deep beauty to your hand-knits. Made of 100% super baby alpaca, the most special grade of Peruvian alpaca there is, this sport-weight yarn is incredibly soft, and with its long fibers and many fine plies, it also creates smooth stockinette and lovely stitch definition. Prepare to knit with your new favorite alpaca yarn!
More Free Knitting Patterns
- Be sure to explore our collection of (mostly free!) Season Alpaca knitting patterns and cast on!
More Sport-Weight Yarns
- Shop our entire collection of sport-weight yarns
- If you want to use a different yarn, be sure to take the time to get the correct gauge. Need help? Check our All About Gauge Tutorial!
More Yarns With Similar Fibers
- Shop alpaca yarn
Looking for more inspiration? Explore all of our free knitting patterns and knitting tutorials, buy one of our many knitting kits and yarn bundles, and shop for beautiful yarn. We have over 35 gorgeous natural fiber yarns in 100’s of magnificent colors, designed to bring integrity, beauty, and joy to your next knitting project and only available at Purl Soho!
Questions please! Is this considered seamless? Also are there other compatible yarns? Last, is this an intermediate pattern? Thanks!
Hi Judy,
Thanks for writing in. I’d be happy to answer your questions!
1. There are a few seams you’ll need to sew in this pattern–just seaming the shoulders together!
2. Most of our other sportweight yarns would be perfect for this pattern. I’d recommend Good Wool in particular.
3. I’d say that this is a beginner/intermediate pattern. But if you’re unfamiliar with any of the techniques used, the pattern provides links to our tutorials on them. You can also always reach out to us for clarification on anything that’s confusing or difficult for you!
I hope this helps!
All the best,
Lili
Hello! Another question please. Would I be able to use standard knit and purl stitches with this pattern and be successful? Thanks!
Hi Judy,
Unfortunately, using standard knit and purl stitches rather than twisted stitches will not work well for this pattern. This is because they create an entirely different gauge and fabric quality! Normal 1 x 1 ribbing is far more stretchy than twisted 1 x 1 ribbing, so it will create a much tighter-fitting garment. I’d recommend sticking to the pattern as written in this regard!
All the best,
Lili
Is it possible to make a shorter version of this vest? I would love to make a version of this that hits at cropped length so it can be worn with high waisted jeans or dress pants. At the length it hits now, tucking it in would hide the lovely details on the sides. If there is any way to modify this let me know!
Hi Lizzy,
Thanks for reaching out! You can definitely modify this vest to be a bit shorter. The easiest way to do that is remove most of the repeats of Rows 1 and 2 that occur near the end of the WORK TO BOTTOM OF V-NECK section. Another thing you can do to shorten the vest is cast on fewer stitches for both the front and back so that it takes fewer rows to decrease to the final stitch count of this section. This will just change the sides a little bit because they won’t overlap as much. Hope this helps!
All the best,
Lili
I’m using a sport weight yarn and size 2 needles and the gauge is 4 1/2 inches wide. Should I go down so size 1 needles or could decrease the number of stitches?
Thanks.
Hi Meghan,
We’d recommend knitting with the size 1 needles to match the same tension used in the pattern. That way you don’t have to rework the instructions in the pattern.
Happy knitting,
Gavriella
Hi I have both yarn and pattern and begun this vest and wondering how do I handle the directions for Row2 (wrong side) …..since this is on circular needles isn’t it always the rightside? DO I just follow the directions for Row 1 again? I am confused why the pattern is obviously saying work in the round- but the instructions seem written for turning around and working both sides, like in the Colorfield Handtowel I just completed. Thanks for your help!
Hi Amy,
Thanks for writing in! This pattern is actually knit flat, not in the round. You’ll need to use circular needles so as to fit all the stitches on the needles without risk of them falling off, but you will turn your work as normal after every row!
All the best,
Lili
Hello, I am using Wigeon for this vest which is slightly thinner than Season Alpaca even though they’re both listed as sport weight. When counting stitches for gauge, how stretched should the blockers watch be? Should the purl stitches be completely obscured? I met gauge with US 3 but the swatch was somewhat stretched after blocking, I may go up to US 4 or 5. Thanks!
Hi Nadia,
I’d recommend checking out our handy All About Gauge tutorial! It has some great tips for blocking and includes a section about ribbing as well!
Happy making,
Gavriella
Thank you, I have read that page and found it very helpful. Since pattern doesn’t specify stretched or unstretched, should I assume it is unstretched? Thanks!
You are very welcome! Yes, I would recommend taking the gauge of the ribbing blocked and unstretched.
I cannot figure out how to do the hem part of this project. I am completely confused. Would it be possible to explain it again in another way?
I don’t really understand where to put the 16 inch needles.
I’m having trouble visualizing how it works.
Thanks for any guidance.
Hi Megan,
Happy to help out! The reason you need 16-inch circular needles at this point is because only a portion of the Front and Back panels overlap. You begin knitting the hem from the first overlapping section (there are two overlapping sections in total, on on each side), and for that to work, you need to start joining the Front and Back together starting from the last 67 (73, 75, 81) (87, 93, 99) (105, 111, 117) stitches of the Back. So in order to access these stitches, you need to separate them from the rest of the Back stitches, which is what the 16-inch circular needle does! You have these final Back stitches on the 16-inch needles, while the rest remain on the 32-inch needle. That way you can start knitting from the middle of the Back and work just the stitches that are on the 16-inch needle!
Al the best,
Lili