This week I cast on for the first of a pair of adderback gloves I am making for myself based on the gloves that Mary Allen knitted for private customers. I’m most closely emulating the green silk gloves that are on display at the Dales Countryside Museum in Hawes. These were knitted for Rev Curwen’s wife when he was vicar at St Andrew’s in Dent.
I’m knitting my gloves with Yorkshire Warmth 4ply/fingering. This is a light fingering weight yarn, akin to an old 3ply yarn, which is the yarn weight I believe Mary generally used. Knitting on 1.75mm needles I’m getting 12 sts per 2.5cm/1″, matching the gauge of the Dentdale gloves I have examined from the Knitting and Crochet Guild collection. This is also the gauge that Sue Leighton White measured on the Mary Allen gloves in the Dove Cottage Museum at Grasmere.
I’ve very closely examined my photographs of the Curwen gloves to get the pattern details correct, including the wrist increases I’ve seen on most of the gloves Mary knitted.
This is how far I’ve got. I’m loving it!
