This post was originally published on another blog of mine, on August 28, 2011.


There are two main things that are great about this cowl:

1. It is a really great framework for making a gorgeous cowl- you can easily modify it to fit different needle sizes, yarn, colors, and even stitches, though this basic ribbed concept makes it elegantly simple.

2. It has a great story! Basically, my girlfriend Robyn found this great cashmere cowl on sale at Banana Republic a few years ago and was so thrilled with it that she wore it on a daily basis. One day she visited her mom in D.C. for Christmas, where a lovely orange wool-eater cat named Ian ate her cowl. The once-lovely cowl was now full of holes.

She e-mailed me, distraught and sent me photos. The cowl was on sale because it was being discontinued- she tried to find another one but couldn’t. I was out of town visiting my family for the holidays as well, so on my flight back home, I designed and furiously knit my version of that cowl in the terminal, on the plane, on the train and on the subway and had a finished product (ends weaved in!) by the time I arrived home. Even though it wasn’t made of cashmere, she loved it! A few differences between her original cowl and my cowl are: the original cowl was wider and longer- the softer cashmere made this possible (I tried this with regular acrylic and it didn’t turn out as well); the original cowl used bulky yarn, whereas I used acrylic.

Comments about the stitching:

I thought it was cool how the original cowl played with variations in ribbing stitches and color- it started and ended with a short sequence of small ribbing while the majority of the piece was in a much chunkier ribbed pattern. In my cowl, I made one end of the smaller ribbing a bit longer and added more repeats of color on one side than the other just for fun. I’ve tried to show some pictures of the stitches and the variation in color length- if I did it again (and I might!), I’d probably make sure there was a tighter gauge so that the variation in stitches is more obvious.

Basically, with this cowl, anything goes! I’m excited to see what kind of cowls will be made based on this template. Here’s the pattern for the version I made:

Materials:

-Size 8 16″ circular needles

-1 stitch marker

-Less than 1 ball of your MC

-Less than 1/2 a ball of your CC

Pattern:

Cast on 81 stitches in your CC; you will use this color less than your MC

Rows 1-2: K1P1 Ribbing Pattern to end of row

Rows 3- 6 (or 4 rows): k3p3 ribbed pattern

Row 7: Switch to MC and continue in k3p3 ribbed pattern

Continue in this pattern with the MC until the piece measures approximately 6.5″ or your preferred height to switch colors

Switch to CC and continue knitting in the k3p3 ribbed pattern for approximately 5 rows

Knit in the k1p1 ribbing pattern for 3 rows

At the time of cast-off, my piece measured 8″ in height.

Thanks for looking! I hope you’ve found this template fun and useful!