Can someone explain ease?

[Megalion]

I'm learned the basic knit & purl long ago and even attempted to knit some garments in highschool. One had a cable even! But neither turned out well despite help from the owner of my LYS at the time. I suspect that she didn't properly emphasize blocking to me and that I was using acrylic yarns which don't block anyways.

This past year, I've returned to the world of knitting and have been picking up all kinds of new tricks thanks to the wealth of information on the interweb!

So I've finally just made my first big purchase of yarn (ie spending more than $5 on a skein of yarn) and bought colinette giotto for making Waterlily Top.

I'm nervous though and all the reading I've been doing about various knitted garments that I want to try talk a lot about ease, positive and negative.

I'm not sure I understand what it is but googling doesn't really help because Google gives me "easy" as a match too which changes the results completely.

I *THINK* it means how much give there is supposed to be between the garment and your body's measurements. ie if the garment's bust is 42" and mine is 40", then that's 2" of positive ease. And if I were 45" that'd be negative 3 inches.

If I'm right, then how do you know when its time to adjust and when it's fine? And people don't always mention where the ease is because bust and hips can be very different too.

Sorry for the long post but this is also my first post here so I thought I'd include a little background on myself to show where I am at.

Thanks in advance!

[suzeeq]

You're right, ease is how loose or snug a garment fits. Some patterns will say - size Sm is for 32", but finished garment measures 34", that's got positive ease. Other patterns will mention negative ease. I knit at a very loose gauge, usually about 3.5 - 4 sts/inch and I usually make sweaters with 2-4" of negative ease. Because the loose knit is stretchier, I don't have to do shaping for the waist (not that I have one, I'm kind of a \_/ shape), so a sweater knit to 40-42" measurement looks fine on my 44" bust.

[Lisa R.]

I have yet to knit a sweater, but I've been reading Knitting Daily, where they've had some really good articles on ease. You understand what it means, but these articles really explain in a lot of detail about how to fit your garments, and there are plenty of photos of different sized women wearing the same sweater and how it fits them, etc.

Here's one. Scroll down for the definition, and search around on their site for fitting garments.

[fibrenut]

Think of ease like men's jeans,
You have tight or fitted (what bullriders wear lol)
"eased" not tight but not loose either (what most dudes wear)
and of course
loose or baggy (think gangsta wear) (sorry just thinking bout those kids with their pants hangin down to their knees just slays me)
That should give you a visual for what is meant by ease.
As for the questions about when and where..... those measurements are usually built into the design by the designer for the silhouette they are shootin for. If it be fitted or baggy or somewhere in between.