When Taylor Swift released a bright orange sparkly cardigan as part of her 12th studio album, The Life of a Showgirl, it took all of my willpower not to add the $70 merch to my cart before it sold out. These cardigans are Swiftie kryptonite, but I already have two and could not justify a third. So I did what any crafty girl thinks when met with something she can’t buy: “I’ll just make one!”
The official cardigan was released on Wednesday, 9/17, and by Friday, 9/19, I had purchased my first yarn supply. My cardigan would not be a replica, but more inspired by the vibe. The largest project I had made to date was a mesh bolero top, which I completed in one weekend. But it wouldn’t be an Angela George project without an impossible deadline and an over-the-top project plan. My burndown chart had me crocheting for 4-6 hours per day for 12 days straight to finish by the album release on 10/3. What I did not anticipate was the finishing touches taking so long.
The plan was simple: a granny square crochet cardigan with 12 squares following the star granny square pattern. The rollout material prominently featured orange sparkly stars, and thus, the pattern for the cardigan (Angela’s version) was born. There are multiple well-known patterns for crocheting the replica of the Taylor Swift cardigans, but those felt a little too ambitious to me. Plus, granny squares meant I could shut off my brain and crochet instead of watching the same tutorial video for hours on end.
My pattern is inspired by Hayhay Crochet’s Cozy Granny Square Cardigan with significant modifications. I modified the sleeves and the length to mirror the oversized merch inspiration and incorporate the stars. My sleeves are made of 9 smaller squares instead of 4 larger ones. 9 kept the sleeves square and allowed for 2 rows of 3 stars on each sleeve. I lengthened the body from 3 to 4 squares long, which felt proportional to 3 square long sleeves.
Supplies
In total, I used 6 skeins of burnt orange, which just barely got me through all the regular granny squares and the two sleeve cuffs. The project also used 2 skeins of tangerine for the granny stars and the rest of the ribbing. And of course, the 1 sparkly yarn ball, which I barely made a dent in, but it was worth it for the effect.
The Granny Squares
Right after work on Friday, I furiously started working on the granny stars. I’d made granny squares before, but the star made these complicated. Plus, I was working with the orange sparkly yarn, which made it hard to see my stitches. It also took several attempts to choose the right hook size for the novelty yarn. On my third attempt, I landed on the 3.5mm hook.
If the timeline wasn’t already crazy enough, I would now be crocheting the whole project with the smallest hook I had ever used. To make the project even more complex, I had chosen bamboo rayon, which is generally hated in the crochet forums for its slippery nature and resistance to blocking. Looking back at the project now, maybe I should have gone for cotton yarn? All I knew was I wanted my cardigan to feel buttery soft and luxurious like the showgirl theme.
12 days, feeling like I spent all my free hours with a crochet hook in hand, but I completed my squares by my self-imposed deadline of the 30th. The next stage was sewing.
Sewing
Sewing this project together took me 3 days, and weaving in the ends took an additional day of work. It felt like I was sewing together Frankenstein’s monster, a massive lump of yarn with its sprawling tails and threads waiting for me to stitch it together and give it life.
The cardigan did not truly come to life until the final rows of ribbing were complete. It was like that scene in Surf’s Up, “find the board within the tree.” Every stitch was one closer to finding the cardigan in the endless piles of yarn.
Ribbing
The ribbing took an additional 3 days. At this point, the album had been out for 4 days when I finally finished on Tuesday, 10/7. It was awkward to start on a new pattern when all my hands had known were granny squares for the last 2 weeks. It started with having to redo the first sleeve cuff twice to get the right fit and be error-free. The next sleeve took an hour after I worked out the kinks in the first. My pattern was one row of decreases, then a single crochet ribbing with a foundation chain of 10.
I was an hour into the bottom edge ribbing when I realized the more flattering side of the ribbing was on the inside. I knew it was a tiny detail, but one I would notice forever if I didn’t redo it. In total, it took me about 6 hours to finish the ribbing (not including my errors). While I crocheted, I watched The Iron Lady, The Martian, and some Taylor Swift hot takes.
Pattern
I won’t write you a full pattern, I don’t really use written patterns to be honest. So here are the videos that helped me make this with some commentary.
Star Granny Squares: 12 needed. I modified this pattern to add 3 additional rows of double crochet so that the length and width equalled 5 inches.
Regular Granny Square: This video is great because it gives tips to get the perfect granny square. Mine turned out very uniform due to the tips here.
Invisible Seam: This is not my favorite explanation, but the way she zips together the corners was critical for a professional finish.
Ribbing: This video showed me how to do the decrease on the sleeve and gave some tips on how to stay consistent. I’ve done ribbing before, so this mostly helped me with the decrease. The pattern is the same for the rest of the ribbing, but I only chained 4 for the bottom edge.
Button holes: I’ve linked the exact part where she explains button holes but it really is as easy as chaining and then joining back in when you have a gap wide enough for a button.
Photoshoot
The inspiration for the photoshoot came to me as I learned more about the source material for the album. I guess the reason I kept my high school copy of Hamlet all these years was to use in a cardigan photoshoot. And I threw in some bonus easter eggs for my fellow Swifties. The main songs that inspired the shoot were “The Fate of Ophelia,” “Honey,” and “The Life of a Showgirl.”
So after 19 days of non-stop work, the cardigan is complete. It is the most fun and ridiculous thing I’ve ever made. Taylor Swift might use similar words to describe her album The Life of a Showgirl. If you want the rest of my takes on the album, watch my latest episode of Voz Memos!
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