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Essential Knit Tee
Quiet beauty and thoughtful design make our Essential Knit Tee pattern an instant classic! It has a classic, minimalist shape, while crochet-chain details at the folded hems add just the right elevated touch. Choose from two light and lovable yarns to suit your season and style: plant-based Oleander, cool and breathable even at the height of summer, or softly glowing Quartz, sumptuous and cozy for cooler weather.
You knit this tee from the bottom up, all in one piece and all in stockinette, working in the round until you get to the armholes, where you’ll divide to work the front and back separately. You seam the shoulders to finish the body, then pick up stitches to knit the sleeves, shaping the sleeve caps with short rows. You’ll find plenty of simple knitting to enjoy, alongside judicious shaping to create a polished finish.
The detail that takes this tee from basic to essential is the folded knit hems at every edge, each trimmed with crochet chains. You’ll work these elegant hems two different ways: first, as a modified provisional cast on at the bottom hem, and then later, for the cuffs and neckline, as a bind off worked from live or picked-up stitches. Both situations are supported by crystal clear video tutorials, so you can learn something new and knit with confidence!
You have two very different fingering-weight yarn options for your Essential Knit Tee, each bringing its own beauty and personality. Quartz, shown above in Autumn Oak, is a wonderfully soft mix of supple merino wool and lustrous suri alpaca, a very special fiber which adds a subtle halo to the fabric. Quartz comes in 25 incredible colors, each glowing with nature’s energy!
Made for sunshine, Oleander is a light-as-a-breeze mix of linen and cotton, available in 15 colors inspired by the warm, earthy tones of Mediterranean landscapes, all with an appealing matte finish. Naturally humectant linen keeps you cool, while cotton brings super touchable softness, and best of all, your Essential Knit Tee in Oleander will be conveniently machine wash- and dry-able, growing softer and more lovely with every wear.
Whether knit in Quartz or Oleander, your Essential Knit Tee will span multiple seasons, have incredible drape, and look absolutely beautiful… A sure-to-be essential!
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!
Pattern designed and written by Purl Soho designer, Gaby Bush.
Share your progress and connect with the community by tagging your pics with #PurlSoho. We can’t wait to see what you make!
Want to print this pattern? On desktop, find the “print” icon in the right margin, and on mobile, scroll to the end of the pattern for it. Use the on-screen instructions to remove anything you don’t want to print!
Materials
- 6 (6, 7, 8, 9) (10, 11, 12, 12) balls of Purl Soho’s Oleander, 50% cotton and 50% linen. Each ball of this fingering-weight yarn is 205 yards/ 50 grams; approximately 1065 (1215, 1385, 1575, 1740) (1885, 2085, 2270, 2455) yards required. We used the color Burnt Sienna.
OR
- 3 (3, 4, 4, 4) (5, 5, 5, 6) skeins of Purl Soho’s Quartz, 65% merino wool and 35% suri alpaca. Each skein of this fingering-weight yarn is 420 yards/ 100 grams; approximately 1020 (1130, 1280, 1455, 1590) (1710, 1865, 2015, 2180) yards required. We used the color Autumn Oak.
You will also need…
- US 3 (3.25 mm) 32- or 40-inch circular knitting needles, depending on size you are making
- US 3, 16-inch circular needles
- A US C (2.75 mm) crochet hook
- Removable stitch markers, including one unique
- Stitch holders
- Several yards of smooth fingering-weight scrap yarn
- An Essential Knit Tee PDF
GAUGE
32 stitches and 39 rounds = 4 inches in stockinette stitch
SIZES
NOTE: For help picking a size, please check out our Understanding Ease + Selecting Your Size Tutorial!
32 (36, 40, 44, 48) (52, 56, 60, 64)
To fit actual chest circumference of 30–34 (34–38, 38–42, 42–46, 46–50) (50–54, 54–58, 58–62, 62–66) inches, with -2 to 2 inches of ease
- Finished Chest Circumference: 32 (36, 40, 44, 48) (52, 56, 60, 64) inches
- Finished Length from Top of Shoulder to Bottom Edge: 22¾ (23¼, 24, 24½, 24¾) (25, 25½, 26, 26½) inches
- Finished Sleeve Length from Underarm to Cuff: 3½ (3½, 3½, 3¾, 3¾) (3¾, 4, 4, 4) inches
Sample: The Oleander version is size 36, worn with 2 inches of positive ease, and the Quartz version is size 32, worn with 2 inches of negative ease.
LEARN ABOUT OLEANDER, QUARTZ + ALL OUR BEAUTIFUL YARNS
Pick from two of our favorite fingering-weight yarns for our Essential Knit Tee pattern: Oleander, the ultimate warm-weather yarn made in Italy from 50% Turkish cotton and 50% Belgian linen; or Quartz, a wonderful mix of 65% merino wool and 35% suri alpaca that is lustrous, radiant, and sumptuously soft.
More Knitting Patterns
- Be sure to explore our collections of (mostly free!) Oleander knitting patterns and Quartz knitting patterns!
More Fingering-Weight Yarns
- Shop our entire collection of fingering-weight yarns (What does fingering-weight yarn mean, really? Our guide to fingering-weight yarn will answer your questions and more!)
- 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 and our Yarn Substitution article for lots of helpful information.
More Yarns With Similar Fibers
- Shop cotton yarn (What helps cotton keep its cool? Learn all about this soft, natural fiber in our guide to cotton yarn!)
- Shop linen yarn
- Shop plant-based yarn
- Shop machine-washable yarn
- Shop merino wool yarn
- Shop suri alpaca yarn
Looking for more inspiration? Explore all of our knitting patterns (including tons of 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!
I really appreciate Purl SoHo’s collaboration with designers who make classic and simple designs.
I’m wondering if this pattern is gender neutral or would I have to modify it for a man?
Hi Keith,
I’m so happy that this pattern has caught your eye! All of our patterns are designed to be worn by people of any gender, but some may fit different body types better than others. I’d recommend taking a look at the measurements listed under SIZES to get a sense of how it fits. If you’d like advice on making any specific modifications, just let me know what you want to change, and I can absolutely help out!
All the best,
Lili
Gorgeous and classic! I want to make one of each, and one in Cattail Silk as well 🤭
Thank you 🙂 Cattail Silk would be a great choice for this pattern!
All the best,
Lili
Would this work in Santolina?
Hi Vinceza,
Thank you for asking! You can definitely use Santolina for this pattern! Since it’s a fingering weight, you can just follow the pattern as is. We just recommend making a quick gauge swatch to make sure you are able to match the same tension as the pattern.
Happy knitting!
Gavriella
Hi!
I’m sure it is me but I have a question about the pattern.
When sewing up the shoulders, the pattern says that the front will be longer than the back but during the preliminary finishing, you will fold the front shoulders over and sew them to the back shoulders and then the front and back will be the same length. Do I fold where I feel I need to or is there a specific length to fold them to? During the preliminary finishing section, I don’t see a notation about folding over the fronts.
Thank you!
Hi Mattie,
Great question! You won’t be folding the fabric at all but instead lining the right front shoulder to the right back and then the same for the left side with the wrong sides facing out. This ensures you are seaming each shoulder to the correct front and back pieces. I hope I understood your question correctly but please let us know if you have any other questions!
All the best,
Gavriella
Hello! love this basic tee pattern. I’m thinking of knitting it up as a striped tee. I don’t anticipate any special difficulties matching up the stripes on the seams for front and back…but wanted to ask if there are other considerations I should think about, particularly with this pattern’s construction, that might not be ideal for a stripe sequence? Would the spacing of the stripes (like a traditional vs. bretton stripe) matter?
Thank you!
Hi Rebecca!
Stripes would look wonderful on this tee! The only thing I would keep in mind is to keep track of how you want to work your short rows when planning out your stripes. Other than that you are good to go!
Happy knitting!
Gavriella
I am working the sleeves on this pattern and don’t understand why the instructions say, “knit stitch without working wrap”. I tried this and I don’t like the bumps so ripped it out. I wonder if I am not understanding the meaning of this instruction. Please advise.
Hi Sally,
Thank you for writing in although we are sorry to hear you are running into issues here. Could you please send a photo of your project to [email protected] so we can have a deeper look? We’ll be able to better visualize what’s going on that way!
All the best,
Gavriella