Through the Loops!: Abingdon

Introducing Abingdon, a two-color, asymmetrical shawl with playful garter stitch stripes, and a charming lace border.

I had so much fun with this design that I quickly whipped up 4 of them. The three above are knit with Bare Naked Wools Breakfast Blend DK in Granite and Marble, Jill Draper Makes Stuff Mohonk in Straw into Gold and Moss, and Madelinetosh Dandelion in Astrid Grey and Fog.

Abingdon is written for DK weight yarn (Bare Naked Breakfast Blend DK), but as the photos above show, it works just as well in fingering (Tosh Dandelion) or Sport (Jill Draper Mohonk). The DK weight version shown is the size small, for the sport and fingering weight samples I knit the large. Once you get going on the pattern you'll see that you can easily add more repeats of the lace bands to make the shawl as large as you'd like.

The fourth version of the shawl (actually, it was the first one I made, but it's the fourth that I'm showing you) I knit with two cakes of Freia Ombré Sport in Lichen. Both cakes were the same color, but I started them from different ends to take advantage of the lovely gradient shifts. Freia comes in 75 gram yarn cakes, so I was only able to work two bands of the lace before running out. But I think the shawl still works well, and is a decent size.

Think of this shawl as a canvas for playing with color. You could use two different gradients for a big bang of color. Maybe try three or four solid colors in different quantities and positions. Or, how about one gradient and one solid, or one solid and one variegated? The possibilities are limitless. Go ahead, stash dive and see what you come up with. And don't forget to send me a message and show off your creation if you do!