The 3 Hour Sweater

I was hanging about waiting for a work meeting to start and trawling the international a few weeks ago, as you do (did I mention that despite my best intentions, I spend far too much time "doom scrolling" online) and came across a 1930s pattern for a short sleeve number on large needles that can supposedly be knit in 3 hours.

1930s black and white pattern illustration for the 3 Hour Sweater. Its a little blurry as it is a copy of a scanned scan from a website, if that makes sense. Image and pattern source is linked in the text above.

Now, if you follow me on the stalky socials, you'll already know that I have been previously burned by another 1930s garment which the pattern claimed could be "knit in an evening". I hate to say it, but unless your evenings are several days in length (in my mind I'm thinking something akin to the Norwegian Polar Night ), it was definitely a very false claim. It actually took me several evenings (from memory it was 4) of doing nothing but knit into the late hours, from cast on to stitch up. Truth in advertising was obviously not really a thing in the thirties (other times other morals I guess).

That being said, I was very happy with the result and would definitely make another. Perhaps next time adding a few extra rows of ribbing to lengthen and a few extra stitches to widen the garment for a better fit (I have significantly more front acreage these days than most vintage patterns allow for).

Image from 1935 pattern that claimed it could be "knit in an evening"

The final result of the 1935 knit completed over several evenings

A quick trawl of YouTube, Ravelry and the interwebs told me that at least a dozen people had attempted the 3 Hour Sweater in the past. While no-one had actually been able to complete it in the allotted 3 hours, most clocked it at somewhere around 11 hours. This is still a very fast knit for a vintage pattern and everyone seemed happy with the final results. So I thought, as a lark, why not give it a go and time myself from go to woah.

Being a vintage pattern, of course the intended yarn has long since been discontinued. I did find this yarn which may be by the same company, however they are located in the United States. I couldn't justify the cost to obtain a few skeins for this essentially experimental knit.

The recommended stitch count and needle sizing indicated that something akin to a 12 or 14 ply yarn in new money was required. I played around a little and found that if I paired some 1980s Fleur yarn (which is around an 8ply or DK weight) with some similar era Holiday yarn (4ply or fingering weight), I could get the recommended 4 stitches to the inch in gauge using the suggested 10mm needles (that's a UK 000 in old money or a US size 15). I am a fairly tight knitter so if attempting the pattern yourself, you might want to play about with your yarns and needle sizing. The pattern doesn't indicate how many rows to the inch, a lot of vintage era knitting patterns don't, so I was definitely guessing in that regard.

Combination of 1980s yarns held together to create the suggested stitch count on 10mm needles

Overall, the pieces knitted up without incident. Timewise, the back panel took me 2 hours and 50 minutes, the front 2 hours 35 minutes and the sleeves I knitted in two sittings with the first taking 1 hour 45 minutes (I've included the time taken to rip back a few rows when I made a mistake here) and the second 1 hour 35 minutes. I just used the stop watch on my phone, pausing it whenever I took a break to make a cup of tea and have rounded all the numbers to the nearest 5 minutes. I'm not a slow knitter, but do find I'm much slower on larger needles. I find anything over 5.5mm (UK 5/US 9) somewhat cumbersome as I have short arms. I can remedy this by using circular needles, but prefer straight needles as my tension is far more even and predictable. I lever knit so am trying to master tucking the left hand needle under my armpit, but its feels weird and I'm not sure I like it.

I do like the little crochet bow detail at the neckline but have seen other versions where this has been replaced with a button. I may hunt around in my button jar for a nice vintage one.

Finishing (sewing up and adding the recommended simple crochet neckband and front tie strings) took me another 55 minutes. Which brings the grand total to 9 hours and 40minutes. Definitely NOT 3 hours, but just under 10 hours is pretty quick for a lady's short sleeve jumper which surprisingly fits me quite well besides being quoted as a vintage size 16 (which in new money is somewhere around an Australian size 10-12). I did add an inch to the body (which will have added around 20 mins to the knit time) but the finished garment still sits just above my natural hip line. My tension is also a little wobbly in places. I'm putting this down to the incredibly loose gauge recommended and my attempts at trying to speed knit on cumbersome size 10 needles. In the image of the finished garment, you might also notice a small hole created by the Yarn Thief who managed to catch a thread while conducting his quality inspection. It should be an easy fix (famous last words anyone?).

All in all, it was an economical knit in terms of yarn using just 75 grams of the Holiday and 120 grams of the Fleur. I think I'd like to try it again one day, perhaps in yarn that is closer to the original or I may even be able to jag some vintage yarn but next time I think I might adjust the tension using needles a few sizes smaller to create a smoother fabric and more defined ribbing. I'll need to adjust stitch counts to accommodate my sizing, which involves some math that I'm currently not motivated to undertake, so its going on the "to-do" list for now. But you never know, I'll make sure to come back and update this post should I ever undertake and finish an adjusted version.

Finished 3-Hour Sweater. Definitely took longer than 3 hours! The recommended tension is much looser than I usually like (you can see a small hole in where the Yarn Thief managed to pull a thread almost immediately I tried it on), but the vintage 80s yarns I used are very snuggly.

If you've made your own version of the 3 Hour Sweater (adjusted or original) I'd loved to see it, so feel free to leave a comment or link to your FO (finished object) or WIP (work in progress). Likewise, I'd also love to know if you've managed to find a vintage knit that actually knits within or even close to, the advertised timeframe. I'm getting the very distinct impression that unless they had some kind of speed knitting super powers we are unaware of, 1930s knitting pattern designers (or at least their publishers) were terrible fibbers.