Several months ago, a shipment of Koigu arrived at Three Bags Full. Luckily I was working that day, so I got to spend most of my five-hour shift unpacking the boxes and rearranging the new colours up on our Wall of Glory (which is what I call the Koigu section in my head)!
We have a Charlotte’s Web shawl in the shop, so I began playing with combinations of colour, in groups of five skeins each. I started adding extra skeins (since that shawl is a bit undersized for me), and wound up with a group of nine that I really loved. Turning to Francesca, I asked if I could design something using the nine, in a beginner-friendly pattern. She gave me the go-ahead, and off I went! About a week later, the wrap was complete and blocked, and it was AMAZING!
Did I mention that the project is all-knit, all-the-time? Yes, NO PURLING!
The double-stranded Koigu blocks out to have a lovely drape, but still springy and stretchy and cozy and full of OOOOHness! (technical term there, “oooohness”) Since the sample wrap has been living in the shop, many of our customers have put together their own colour choices, and getting to see each new wrap has been a lot of fun!
Some hints for choosing nine colours: pick a skein you love, pick another one that you think will look good next to your skin, and pick a third that will be a darker anchor at the hem of the shawl. Now, fill in the gaps: find colours that bridge the gap from one to the next, sharing a few colours in common with the skeins on each side. Don’t be afraid if one colour seems to jump out a bit - this adds a visual sparkle to your wrap!
This is a free download, available through Ravelry (though you don’t need to be a member). If you ARE a Ravelry member, it would be great to see your completed project photos! If you aren’t on Ravelry, what’s keeping you?!
Click here for Free Download of ColourFlow Wrap pattern.
Go here to see the Colourflow Wrap project page on Ravelry. Hopefully others will post their projects quickly so we can all ooh and aah over the glorious colours!
Many thanks to Megan McPeak for allowing me to take photos during the final stage of her project!
Now, the tutorial! Please note that this does not include enough information to create the wrap, you will need to download the PDF and read through the pattern to get started. This WILL help you out when it comes to the final stages of cutting and fringing. Enjoy!
After you unravel the final 10 stitches, the 11th loop should be at the top of the column of twisted stitches.
The tail end of yarn has been threaded through the last live stitch, so all cast-off stitches are now secured and will not unravel. Live stitches on the left will be unravelled after cutting, to become the fringe!
The white arrows indicate the columns of wrapped stitches. The cut line is 10 stitches away from each of these columns.
The pink line shows the column of knit stitches that you can follow as you cut. Untie any knots as you come to them, and trim these after the fringe has been knotted.
Starting at the end with live stitches, pull out one row of stitches at a time until you have reached the cast-on edge (which gets pulled out, too!)
Whee! Isn't it nice to have this happen on purpose, instead of by accident?
Make the first layer of knots close to the knitted fabric, using 8 strands for each knot. Fudge the number of strands as you get close to the end if needed (your row count may differ from mine). You can see how the first bundle in the second row of knots is thicker than the rest - this will be true of the first and last bundle, as they will have all the strands of the edge bundle plus half of its neighbour. You can choose to knot all of the first row before beginning the second row, it won't affect the final outcome.
PS - wondering about the spelling? You say Colorflow, I say Colourflow - ’cause I’m Canadian, eh?
