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Updated: Nov 28, 2001

Anyone who's a Harry Potter fanatic knows there is a lot of knitting in the books.  I made a scarf modeled after the one in the movie, and a hat to match it; several members of the Knitlist and KnitU are also working on similar projects.  

I've created a forum for discussion about knitting in Harry Potter, you can access it here!

Also there is a discussion list for knitting in Harry Potter, check it out here!

This page is meant to help those of us who are designing sweaters and scarves to match the movie.  All of these pictures came from www.hpgalleries.com. These pictures are ALL copyright Warner Brothers. (some are also copyrighted by their respective photographers) I've cropped some of them to show only the relevant part of the screen shot.

I've started a compilation of online Harry Potter-inspired patterns. Check it out here!

Choose One:

bulletThe Scarf
bulletThe Quidditch Sweater
bulletThe School Uniform Sweater
bulletThe Red Sweater
bulletThe "Weasley Sweater"
bulletRon's Weasley Sweater
 

 

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Knitting in Harry Potter
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Golden Snitch Stuffed Toy
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The Scarf:

My Thoughts:

It's plain to see that this is a stocking stitch scarf, probably a tube scarf.  It looks like the scarf is pretty wide, and the stripes are not as tall as they are wide. So if you are making your scarf 6" wide, make the stripes about 4" tall to keep it in proportion.  There is also fringe in alternating color bunches, about the length of a color stripe.  I'm estimating the length of this scarf as pretty long, because you can see that Hermione has hers tied around her neck loosely, and it still reaches to about her waist. 

There has been some discussion online about whether these scarves are the wrong colors.  People are saying that they are "maroon and yellow" when Gryffindor's colors are "scarlet and gold." I'd like to point out the difference in color values even between the above photos, which were all taken of the same scarves. Everyone must keep in mind that different screens display colors differently, and so do different media types! Make the scarf the color you think it should be, don't try to match what you see on your screen, because when you see on the big screen, and when you get it on video and watch it on the little screen, you're sure to see a different color!

These are my takes on scarlet vs. maroon:

Scarlet?

Maroon?

I think everyone's making way too big a deal about this.  Pick the color you want and tell yourself that it's the right color for you!  Or better yet, let the person you're making the scarf for pick it, so they won't be able to complain.  =)  I used "burgundy" and "gold" Red Heart yarn, as per my boyfriends' requests. Burgundy is closer to maroon than to scarlet, but Matt did not like the scarlet that was available in RH. 

Something else to think about: scarlet and gold are the colors for Gryffindor House, so you could easily use the colors from another house if you wanted to represent those houses instead. Those colors would be:

Ravenclaw: Blue and Bronze
Hufflepuff: Yellow and Black
Slytherin: Green and Silver

Note to knitters: These scarves are NEVER mentioned in the books.  They are a new thing made for the movie.  So if you want to make something more authentic, you might prefer to make Dobby socks (mismatched socks in crazy patterns) or a scarlet sweater with a gold lion on it, which Mrs. Weasley gives to Harry for a Christmas present in the third book.

Update 10/30/01: I found a picture online, drawn by the original illustrator for the HP series, and it shows Harry wearing a striped scarf, standing in front of the Hogwarts Express! So there IS a reason for the scarf's existence! It still isn't mentioned in the book, but at least we know it was not made up for the movie version! That makes me happy! (in case you couldn't tell!) BUT! This picture seems to support the idea that the colors in the movie are wrong, the red in his scarf would never be called maroon, though it is certainly not what I would call scarlet. Oh well!

Here is the picture (copyright Thomas Taylor):

Update 11/28/01: After watching the movie, I have a different take on these scarves. They are DEFINITELY tube scarves. They are also much MUCH wider than we had previously thought, probably at LEAST 12" across. The students receive these scarves the first night when they arrive at school, and in the movie you can see the scarves laying over the backs of chairs -- the scarves take up most of the chair backs! That is how wide they are when they are flat.

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The Quidditch Sweater:

My Thoughts:

These may be the most recognizable sweater once the movie comes out, it is the sweater worn by the Gryffindor Quidditch team under their Quidditch robes (which are scarlet on the outside and gold on the inside). The sweaters appear to be either stocking stitch or a 2x2 rib, but since they were made on knitting machines instead of by hand, the ribbing is different. A 2x2 rib would pull in tightly, which is not how these sweaters lay. Some ideas for knitting this sweater by hand would be to use shaker or double knitting to get the ribbed effect, or to just ignore the ribbing and knit it plain. You can see a detail of the collar on the top picture, which shows us that these are crew neck sweaters with the gold detailing at the base of the neckline.  We can probably assume that the wrists also have the same detail. (note that in another picture, the bottom of the sweater is visible and there in NOT a gold stripe at the bottom, which is not fitted but lays fairly straight) The stripe on the chest is wider than a typical striped sweater (the ones which were so in style 2 seasons ago), and is also placed lower to allow the space for the house badge. These are drop shoulder sweaters but that detail probably isn't too important to non-knitters.

If I were making this sweater, I'd make it top down in order to determine the spacing. For the badge, you can go to any Warner Brothers store and buy something with the badge on it, then cut the badge out and sew it on (thanks to Marion from the KnitList for that idea!). I'd start from the neck, knit enough space for the badge, then start the gold stripe, making it about 5" wide. That is probably the hardest part of this sweater, any old pattern would work! 

Another Note: This sweater is also not mentioned specifically in the books, which only mention "uniforms" and "robes" when describing Quidditch clothing. They do look great, though!  And we can assume that the other houses have the same sweaters, in their own colors. There are no stills as of yet of the other houses' quidditch players, so we can only guess what those uniforms would look like.

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The School Uniform Sweater:

Under their school robes, the students all seem to be wearing school-colored ties and gray sweaters with school-color detailing. This would be a really easy sweater to make, it is probably all stocking stitch and drop shouldered. And actually, this would probably be a great sweater to buy store bought, and then add the color details.  All you have to do is buy a gray v-neck sweater at the store, then duplicate stitch scarlet and gold stripes around the neckline! (and maybe around the wrists, too. Though not at the very edge of the wrists, as we can see them and they're gray) Talk about a last-minute gift. This might also be a good thing to make if you don't want to be screaming "Harry Potter Fan!" -- only true fans will even notice you're wearing something HP related.

Update 11/28/01: After seeing the movie, I noticed that ALL the students wear this uniform. Each house has its colors on the edge of the sweaters and on the ties. The best part of this is that when the new students arrive, they are wearing PLAIN gray sweaters and plain ties! That was a great detail that they added to the movie. When the students enter the hall to be sorted, their sweaters are still plain, and after they are sorted the sweaters stay plain, but the next day the colors are there! Pretty cool. It's not clear whether they change magically (which wouldn't fit too well with other things in the book, such as Ron's ugly dress robes in book 4), or if they're given new sweaters and ties along with their scarves and other school-color stuff that they receive that first night.

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The Red Sweater:

 

Harry seems to be wearing this sweater in a long scene during the movie. At first I thought this might be the sweater that Mrs. Weasley makes for him as a Christmas present, but then I realized that her sweater was "emerald green." So this may just be a random sweater that he has, though that doesn't seem to fit in with the story line, which specifies that the Dursleys only give him Dudley's old clothes, which are always 4 times too big for Harry. Since this sweater clearly fits him, and does not resemble a uniform of any kind, it remains a mystery where he got it and why.

Of course, it is always possible that the movie makers have changed Mrs. Weasley's gift sweater's color to scarlet to match his House. If this is Mrs. Weasley's sweater, then it might be fun to make! This is also a drop-shoulder crew neck, only this time it has cables running vertically. It looks like this sweater was also machine made (big surprise there), and it looks like pretty fine weight yarn. The cables are simple cables, probably 3x3 or something, with a few purl stitches to edge them, and the same amount of knit stitches between the cables. The cables also continue down the sleeves. There is ribbing at the waist and wrists, but the neckline is fairly loose/wide. This also would be easy to make, and is probably just as easy to find for sale at any store. Most people probably won't recognize it as being HP related, though, so it may not be worth the trouble. =)

Update 11/28/01: After watching the movie, it seems that this sweater was purchased by Harry with the money he got out of Gringott's. He also purchased 2 other sweaters EXACTLY like this one, one in blue and one in green. This red sweater is the one he wears at the end of the movie when he's saving the Sorcerer's Stone from Quirrel/You-know-who.

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The "Weasley Sweater"

In mid-October, this picture was added to the hpgalleries's movie gallery, with the caption, "Harry in his Weasley Sweater." I don't know what to make of this, because we know for a fact from the book, that he received an "emerald green" sweater (no mention of the letter H) for Christmas from Mrs. Weasley. This is clearly blue, with a gold H on it, and just like the red sweater above, seems to fit him well enough, and therefore is not a hand-me-down from Dudley (the "h" pretty much rules out a hand-me-down anyway.) I have no idea what is going on here, seems the movie is changing pretty significant things!

Again this is a drop-shouldered sweater, done in splain stocking stitch, with a loose crew neck. This is another perfect candidate for buying from the store and altering, though I personally would NOT make this sweater, as it does not fit into the book at all. Though I suppose we should wait and see the actual movie before jumping to any conclusions.

Update 11/28/01: After having watched the movie, this sweater is NOT IN IT. It is clearly something that was cut out of the movie for the sake of keeping it short enough. There were over 4 hours of tape for this movie, which got cut down to 2.5 hours, so it's no surprise that there are entire scenes that aren't in the final cut. I am guessing that this shot of Harry is of him sitting in front of the mirror that shows him his parents. I do believe that this is the movie version of Harry's Weasley sweater, and I'm still disappointed with that. It seems, however, that these sweaters may be popping up everywhere because there is at least one site online that is selling them, we may be seeing them on all the little kids. Personally, I hope not.

As shared on the KnitU list, the company that provided the Weasley sweaters has a website. They are selling them! Knitters can definitely use their pictures for details/inspiration if you're trying to replicate one of them. Here is the link:

Pride and Joy 

(this site also has Neville's fair isle sweater and vest and Hermione's fair isle cap)

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Ron's Weasley Sweater

This is a terrible picture, I know, and I'm sorry about it. =) It's the only one I could find online that shows what the boys' Weasley sweaters look like. In the movie version, Ron's sweater is the right color (yay!). However, the book makes a point to mention that Ron's sweater did NOT have an R on it, only Percy's, George's, and Fred's sweaters had their letters on it. 

All of the Weasley sweaters are done in a flecked type yarn (this one is burgundy with grayish/white flecks, while Fred and George's are blue with flecks), and they all have this strange wide neck. My theory is that the neckline is supposed to be representative of Mrs. Weasley "lumpy" sweater production, as described in the books. The sweaters all seem to be baggy, also, with the drop sleeves being very low on the arm. The letters are about as wide as they are tall and resemble a Times New Roman typeface (though it is NOT, as far as I can tell, that exact typeface).

Check out Pride and Joy to see more examples of Weasley sweaters in different sizes.

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