knit/lab/safavid
A brightly colored shawl inspired by tiles and ceramics from the Persian Safavid Dynasty.
MC: ColorShift Yarn Gamboge (yellow) warm and cool gradations 100% Merino wool,
16 x 80yd/73m skeins
The sample requires approximately 1000yds/920m of MC.
CC shades are a selection of Jamieson's Shetland Spindrift totaling approximately 750m/815yds:
4 quarter motifs require approximately 2.2m/2.4yds each, 30 half motifs approximately 3.9m/4.33yds each, and 88 full motifs require approximately 7m/7.66yds each
For most of the CC shapes I spliced shorter lengths of yarn into mini gradations to create more shimmer; in the sample the CC shades are distributed quite randomly - they could be arranged more formally, in stripes, bands, diagonals, clusters, gradations, etc.
Needle size: 2.75mm/US2, Finished dimensions: approximately 71ins/180cm by 61ins/68cm
Gauge: approximately 23 stitches and 25 rows = 4in/10cm in stranded intarsia pattern
Techniques include back and forth stranding, intarsia, trapping and lace knitting on RS and WS rows, with 5 or 6 colors in each row.
The pdf includes charts, short written instructions and notes, and a phototutorial on splicing yarn ends.
$7.00
detail of Safavid tile panel, Iran
tile photo © Michel wal
Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 3.0
This pattern has been a long time in the making and unfortunately ColorShift Yarn is not available at the time of publication. Depending on preference, you could use a plain MC or put together a similar gradation or group of colors with a similar yarn. For example, you could use 8 - 10 of the Jamieson's Shetland Spindrift yellows for a similar effect. The gradation can be seen along the borders of the flat image above.
