Shawl enough for a Man

Happy New Year!

OK, glad that is over with. I have never felt any significance of the turn of the year, it has always seemed kind of arbitrary to me. Who decided that January got to go first? Most likely there is a long and historical explanation, but I cannot be bothered to go suss that out. There is knitting to perpetrate! I have had quite a few things percolating and I am stoked to be able to finally get them out into the world!

Luckily I get to decide what comes first here and the first in this new year is Curiosity.

The Sport weight version of Curiosity

It is no secret that I adore Malabrigo yarn. It is quirky and beautiful and I cannot get enough of it. They are also an awesome company who puts their yarn where their mouth is when it comes to supporting independent designers. The Malabrigo Quickies program is a fantastic opportunity for designers to pitch ideas to Malabrigo and receive support if accepted. The designer gets to publish their pattern exactly the way they release their other patterns and Malabrigo gets a new pattern that features their yarn. It is totally Win/Win.

It wears great all tucked in.

Do you remember last fall when NASA actually sent a successful rover mission to Mars? In this day and age of spectacular fiction media it is kinda easy to be underwhelmed by the photos sent back by the rover – but I am totally a space geek and was stunned by the idea that we were LOOKING AT THE SURFACE OF ANOTHER PLANET. I mean really, it is freaking amazing.

When I found out that one of the new color-ways that I got to choose from for this project was named Marte (Mars in Spanish) it was perfect. Add that to my penchant for fiddling with the odder aspects of knitting Marte became Curiosity. This wrap walks the line between shawl and scarf, you get to decide what you want to make. If you use a lot of yarn, you are going to get a shawl. If you use less, you will get something that is more of a scarf.

The shape is … Curious

And you can use any yarn you want. Any yarn, any needle, any size. I had testers & reviewers work in Malabrigo Sock, Malabrigo Lace held double, Malabrigo Rios, & Malabrigo Silky Merino. Some of the projects are not yet done, I cannot wait to see how they turn out. The upshot of all of this wiggle room in this pattern is that it is truly a unisex pattern. Depending on the choices you make you can skew the results to be completely masculine, feminine or something in between.

If you hadn’t noticed, I tend to trend toward a little complicated. But for this I tried really hard to keep things simple. Garter & Stockinette – that is all that is going on here. The shape is the only thing that is a deviation from the norm. Increasing irregularly along the center line, you end up with a long and gentle curve that drapes easily around the neck and shoulders. The longer you make it the wider the trumpet end gets, eventually you end up with something that is distinctly a shawl – but for the sample in Arroyo (sport weight super-wash) I stuck with one skein that yielded something in-betweenish in size.

Wrapped a little more shawl-like.

So – what kind of Curiosity do you think you might make? Inquiring minds want to know.