A "Zero-Waste" Seam

Many of my knitting unventions come from solving a problem. I tend to work backward in my design process. I start with a vision — oh, wouldn't it be nifty if I made thing X? — and then try to figure out how to do it. I like excellent construction. I believe in the value of fine craftsmanship. That brings me to the problem of Volute.

cover photo of Volute

As you can see, this is a mohair cocoon. There's nothing wrong with making a mohair cocoon. The part I don't like, and that my student who is making it doesn't like, are the seams across the back.

back view from the pattern booklet

The seams look like scars. The fabric is diaphanous. This is also a mohair stockinette death march — a full 2 yards of knitting. Yes, it is 6 feet of knitting, or 2 meters if you want to think in metric. I borrowed this project from my student and worked on it at Dragon Con because I'm a fast knitter. But if you are not a fast knitter, this is a slog. On the other hand, the fabric is lovely. I think this will be a beautiful, elegant finished object.

From the start, we discussed what to do about the seams.

Volute has interesting, un-intuitive construction. It is basically a long scarf with a little bit of short-row shaping at each end. Then you seam the narrow top and bottom ends to each other, as if making an infinity scarf or cowl. That forms the shorter vertical seam in the picture. It was obvious how to improve that — simply graft the end to the beginning. A grafted seam sewn carefully to match the tension of the surrounding fabric is invisible.

That horizontal seam was the bigger problem. It is two long selvedges. A normal mattress stitch seam loses one stitch on each side of the fabric. In a solid fabric that's fine, as long as the pattern is designed to match up without breaking. But in a fabric with some transparency, that seam allowance becomes a pronounced thick line cutting across the sheet of sheer fabric. What to do?

In this case, I used a vertical lifeline. Then, I seamed through the "free stitches" you get on the vertical lifeline.

Video:

Because this seam is essentially a graft, you can either pull it snug or you can work it to match the tension of the surrounding fabric. It does not eliminate any selvedge wales, meaning you don't have to worry either about a thick seam allowance or about breaking a pattern because you forgot to add stitches to accommodate the seam allowance. You do need to plan ahead and run vertical lifelines in the fabric as you knit.

My result isn't perfect, but it is, I think, much improved from the example in the pattern. While you can see a little disruption at the long horizontal seam, it does not smack you in the face and make you wonder, "What happened there?"

Using the vertical lifeline stitches is not quite as snug a seam as traditional mattress stitch. But it is still usable. Make up a swatch, give it a try, and see what you think!