The last couple of evenings have been spent partying, with Friday being a small wedding reception. So today is recovery and really not doing much. Ok, so I say not much, but I’ve been looking at shawls and thinking about my SP’s question about whether I’d consider knitting lace, and I think I may have found a concept I like…
The shoalwater shawl. This is a basic triangular piece knit from the top down. I then started playing around with it. I started thinking about changing it to a semi circle to lose the point, and so the increases wouldn’t be concentrated in 3 areas. I found the old shale tablecloth which is worked from the centre outwards, and thought it could be adapted to suit. Reconsidering, I’ve found shawls slip too easily when I try wearing them, so I started looking at other shapes. This turned up various images and comments about faroese shawls, which frankly intrigue me a lot! There’s even some basic notes on how to make them out there. However, it isn’t clear whether they should be worked top-down or bottom-up or whether the shoulders are shaped in the center of the triangles or along the outer edge . Last but by no means least, there’s also a cross between a stole and triangle idea in the pacific waves shawl.
Lots of shapes and decisions to make! If I go ahead with this, it’ll be next year sometime. Talk about organisation! The common theme is the pattern, so I’d better make a swatch or several with the help of the knitting fiends maths to see if I like it as much in real life…
Myrna Stahman’s your woman for top down Faroese shawls. If you can get hold of a copy of the Knitter’s Magazine Shawls compilation there’s one of her patterns in there. I’m wearing the result as I type. It stays on well even if I don’t knot it behind (which I tend to since I don’t want the points dragging in stuff while I stumble around getting my first cup of tea of the day). The shaping’s near the top of the triangles BTW.
Thankyou
I’ll check her stuff out. And it’s good to know this style of shawl does work.