Joining sleeves in seamless bottom-up cardigan converted from seamed pattern

Hello fellow knitters,

This is my first time converting a seamed bottom-up cardigan pattern to seamless, and I need help converting the armhole and sleeve top shapings. I would like to join the sleeves at the armholes and continue the entire top part seamlessly. Is it possible given the shaping instructions for the seamed construction written below? The full pattern is here: https://novita.com/en/patterns/mens-cable-cardigan-novita-suomivilla-finnwool. I’m making the second smallest size.

Armhole shaping:
Keeping pattern correct, cast off 4 sts at the beg of the next 2 rows.

Cast off 2 sts at the beg of the next 4 rows.

Cast off 1 st at the beg of the next 6 rows, 99 sts.

Continue in pattern until armhole measures 19[20:21:22:22:23] cm.

Sleeve top shaping:
Cast off 5 sts at beg of next 2 rows. 74 sts.

Cast off 3 sts at beg of next 2 rows. 68 sts.

Cast off 2 sts at beg of next 4 rows. 60 sts.

Dec 1 sts at each end of next and every row 13 times, 34 sts.

Cast off 2 sts at the beg of the next 2 rows, 30 sts.

Cast off 3 sts at the beg of the next 2 rows 24 sts.

Cast off rem sts.

Many thanks for your help!

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Welcome to KH!
This is somewhat of a tall order. There are contiguous sleeves used in some top down sweaters that look like set in sleeves. I haven’t seen a bottom up sweater with incorporated sleeves unless it was a yoke sweater.
One thing you can do is work the body of the sweater and seam the shoulders then pick up sts around the armhole. Work short rows to make the sleeve cap and then continue to knit the sleeves in the round.
Carol Feller explains the technique here:

Ann Budd has a couple of books for designing sweaters that may also help.

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Thank you salmonmac! I’ve already knitted the body and both sleeves up to the armhole. Is the best option now to continue shaping the body and sleeves separately then seam them together?

I know it’s not what you would prefer but it’s not so difficult to set in the sleeve. I match up the middle of the cap with the front/back seam the match the underarm cast offs to each other. Then is you pin the sides in 2-4 places, seaming is pretty straightforward.
I don’t know if Ann Budd considers this sleeve construction but you might look for her books in your local library just to check.
Maybe you would like to invent a method for bottom up set-in, seamless sleeves?

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This designer seems to have tackled the challenge:

Amy Herzog has some good posts on setting in sleeves on her blog if you decide to go with knitting the sleeve caps flat:

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Thanks, kushami. I’d never seen this construction.

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Thank you for the links! I did look at a couple of Emma Welford’s designs. Unfortunately the challenge with the pattern I’m working with is the mismatching number of stitches to bind off at the beginning on the body and sleeves.

Guess I’ll have to knit these parts flat!

No, I hadn’t either, but I just happened to see that blog a couple of months ago.

I won’t be trying it because I often need to adjust elements after a garment is finished. So I prefer to knit flat so I only have to unravel one piece.

I think the designer did a nice job though, judging by the photos. I wonder how complicated the instructions are.

I’d like to give it a try on a sample just out of curiosity. It may be one of those things that are clearer once you see it on the needles. Many thanks!

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I have often thought that I should make up sample child-size sweaters in various construction styles. I think one of Amy Herzog’s books took this approach.

I used to be in a spinning group (but a lot of knitting went on too) and it would have made a nice display for the hall or to put up when we had a stall at events. I hope I can get back to the group someday when I feel a bit better.

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Fingers crossed. It sounds like a lovely group. I hope you get back to it soon too.

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It’s not complicated at all actually. Place the underarm stitches on hold, then join the sleeves to the body with 1 decrease on body followed by 1 decrease on the sleeve for front and back and left and right for a few rows, then decreases on the sleeves only, then some short rows for the shoulders.

This is my first time knitting a men’s cardigan but I’m not sure that her gradual decreases would work well for men’s bulkier upper arms and shoulders.

Sorry, I’m not sure what this is referring to :slight_smile:

Did you mean to reply to someone else?

I was replying to this about the instructions.