Thataway hat | PDXKnitterati

Deep End is a 2 color brioche hat knit in the round from the bottom up. One side features a large staghorn motif, the other side uses a variation of the gull stitch. I like wearing the staghorn on the side, but you can style it any way you want.

I designed this hat as a teaching piece for my classes. You’ll learn both left and right leaning brioche double decreases on the first patterning round; it’s like jumping in the deep end of the pool! After that it’s oodles of brioche rib before the next increases and decreases.

Two crown options are included. Choose the quadruple decreases for a challenge, or go back to the shallow end of the pool with familiar double decreases.

This pattern is available through Ravelry. It’s on sale for 10% off through October 8, no coupon code needed.

This pattern is also available through Payhip, and it’s on sale there, too.

Thanks to tech editor Meaghan Schmaltz, and test knitter Ann Berg.

I’m teaching a Zoom class with this pattern through Twisted on Saturday October 24. If you’d like me to email you when registration goes live, leave me a comment. (Coordinating all aspects is like a dance, and the pattern has to go live before the class can go live. One step at a time!)

Remember this? It was going swimmingly, until I got to the planned swirly decreases for the crown. It was a great plan, but in real life I didn’t like that the decreases didn’t hit the staghorn and gull motifs in a consistent way. I worked out another decrease for the top, but it’s based on 10 stitches instead of 6 or 12, which is the number of stitches I had. Blergh.

So I started over. But first, I checked to make sure I would like the new crown shaping. I decreased the extra stitches out, and then worked out the new planned crown. Just to make sure I wasn’t starting over for nothing.

It worked just fine, but it’s a much more rapid decrease than the swirly top, so the hat has to be knit taller before beginning the decreases. Ask me how I know. Call it a giant swatch. Yup.

I reknit the hat in 2 days. Partly because I can be a bit obsessive with my knitting. Also, I had a date with my tech editor for Monday, and it had to be ready because she’s booked for months.

I love it! The new decreases look just right with the gull stitch.

And the staghorn side is a thing of beauty at the top. Well, it is to me, at least.

The hat is being test knit now, and it will be published soon.

I frogged the first hat to reclaim the yarn, and am playing with mitts. Small circumference brioche is a bit fiddly with dpns or flexiflips or magic loop or 2 circulars! It’s so easy to gain or lose a YO by accident. But mitts could be very pretty. We’ll see how it works out.

In the meantime, I’m planning more classes. My classes with Twisted sold out immediately, so I added another Petite Brioche in October, and that sold out, too. We’re planning more. I’m thinking of Petite Brioche again on Sunday October 18. Message me if you want an email when registration goes live.

The new hat will be the project for a brioche increase/decrease class; I’m really looking forward to that. I’m planning that for Saturday, October 24, but I can’t list it until the pattern is ready. Soon! Again, message me if you want an email when registration goes live.

Smoke update: We had thunder/lightning/downpour at 4 a.m. The air is now merely Unhealthy, which is a vast improvement from Beyond Index, Hazardous, and Very Unhealthy! It will get better, bit by bit.

Onward!