Make this in sport or even fingering weight. Requires 550 yards of one MC and 450 yards CC.

MC (Darker) - De Rerum Natura Ulysse in Darjeeling
CC - Sunday Morning in Shhh

Thoughts about this Project:

• When I saw the design I knew I’d have to knit this project - even though the equilateral triangle is not my preferred shawl shape. I’m glad I’ve knitted this because it’s very enjoyable and unique.
• It took me the set up and then one repeat of the main chart to memorize the pattern (though I did continue to look at the right side rows of the chart for a couple of seconds, before knitting those rows, to ensure I hadn’t forgotten anything). Point is, it didn’t click immediately. During the first repeat, I wouldn’t have thought I’d get to the point that I’d remember this mosaic pattern, because it is a bit tricky at the start, but all of a sudden, I did and then it went from being fussy to being very chip-knitty. Having said that, by the end there are a zillion stitches on the needles so I was happy to be done.
• A propos of stitch numbers - this is the first shawl ever wherein I didn’t count the stitches compulsively?!? In fact, I didn’t count at all (who even am I?)! I didn’t bother cuz I had stitch markers all over the place to delineate repeats per row and where the increases should occur. As long as that worked, I figured I was fine. I am curious to know what stitch number I ended with, though I could do the math… I estimate it was close to 500. I did the number of repeats recommended but the pattern doesn’t provide a final number.
• Though I started with the recommended needle size, over the set up I went up to US7 and then landed on US8. I am an even knitter (not tight) so this is odd for me but this design does utilize colour work and the fabric mosaic knitting creates is very dense. I read many other project pages that indicate that the finished object can come out rather small and stiff if knit too tightly.
• I actually used one fine fingering yarn (the ET Sunday Morning) and one sport weight yarn (De Rerum Ulysse) - not the recommended DK - and I could still block to instructed dimensions because I used a bigger needle. I also feel that using yarn of slimmer gauge, on the flowers, can contribute to the overall drape.
• I did the increases as instructed. I did find it tricky on some rows but I prefer M1 increases to yarn over increases.
• I did not find the chart-reading to be challenging - I actually found the pattern very clear.

About the Yarns: I loved the Sunday Morning in this project (but then I love that yarn). While not very evenly plied (it is thick and thin though very lightly plied), it creates an even finished fabric. The Ulysse was strange. I’m not sure if I like its irrepressible spring. It’s also very sticky so it didn’t flow through fingers fantastically and was difficult to pull from the ball. It comes in great colours and, if I like the density and drape of the finished fabric, I may well use it again (it’s well priced, non-super wash, great colour palette).

Grafting the Provisional Cast On: This wasn’t the easiest element of the project, picking up the stitches from the waste yarn was tight. I opted to graft the provisionally cast on stitches using needles 2 sizes smaller than that in which I knit the main fabric because I started the scarf on a US6. It might be useful to graft from needles down a size from whatever needle you use at the cast on.

About The Border: I opted to do the border as written with the exception of maintaining the partial flowers. Unfortunately, I didn’t pay a lot of attention to when I’d need to amend the pattern to leave them out so I ended up having to rip back 4 rows (after seeing if I could just ladder down - um, no) and the whole process took a good 2 hours, never mind the hour it took to knit those 4 LONG rows in the first place. Oh well. For future reference if you opt to remove the final partial flowers, on row 89 you’ll need to begin the pattern modification by NOT knitting the 4 flowers that would begin at this row. Just do the “between flowers” pattern of RS - k contrast / slip main colour and WS - k main colour / slip contrast colour. I coloured in the chart in the relevant places so that I wouldn’t forget. Hilariously, in retrospect, I think I might have preferred to keep the partial flowers in the design because the symmetric positioning looks a bit odd, having left them out.

About the Bind Off: I opted for a 2-stitch icord bind off. I wouldn’t recommend more than 2-stitch width because the shawl ends with a garter ridge that will come to look like an extra stitch of width. To work a 3-st BO would have been rather wide/prominent.

For BO, I also went down a needle size from US 8 to US 7 and I’m glad I did because, though I generally bind off evenly in the needle size that an item is knit with, I noted on various project pages that there are a few shawls having rather loose BOs (though some of those might have been done using the instructed tubular BO, which was noted by many to produce too much stretch). I suspected that the Italian/sewn BO would be too loose (and too much trouble at ~500 stitches) so I went with icord for a neat edge that would be firmer. Glad I did. The BO took 6g of yarn but I don’t know how many stitches I had at that point.

Pre-Blocked Dimensions:

Depth at spine: 26.5”
Length at long edge (wingspan): 55.5”
Length at “side” edges: 42”

Block to 72” at wingspan and 33” depth of spine (pattern post-blocked dimensions) - note, I was able to pin it to these dimensions without issue though the yarn is so springy, I imagine it will shrink slightly after the pins are removed…

Post-Blocked Dimensions:

Depth at spine: 32”
Length at long edge (wingspan): 68”
Length at “side” edges: 47”