Freia Fine Handpaints Fletchling Shawl Knitting Pattern

Freia Fine Handpaints Fletchling Shawl

What Is Being Made

The Fletchling Shawl is an asymmetrical lace shawl designed by Tina Whitmore for Freia Fibers. This elegant accessory features a distinctive triangular silhouette with a finished size of approximately 63 inches from tip to tip and 28 inches deep at its widest point, making it a versatile wrap suitable for layering or draping.

Knitting Techniques

This shawl is constructed using several key knitting techniques that create its sophisticated appearance:

• Bottom-Up Construction: The shawl is worked from the tip upward, allowing knitters to adjust the final size based on yarn availability.
• Seamless, Worked Flat: The design is created on a single circular needle worked back and forth in rows, eliminating the need for seaming and creating a continuous, polished fabric.
• Lace Patterning: The shawl incorporates openwork lace elements that add visual interest and drape to the finished piece.
• Mirrored and Offset Purl Ridges: The stitch pattern features decorative purl ridges that are strategically mirrored and offset across the knit background, creating textural contrast and visual movement.
• Fletch Patterning: Sporadic fletch patterning sections break up the main design, adding complexity and asymmetrical visual interest to the shawl.

Stitches Used

The Fletchling Shawl employs fundamental and intermediate knitting stitches to achieve its textured lace design:

• Knit (K): The primary stitch forming the base fabric.
• Purl (P): Used to create the decorative ridge lines and textural contrast against the knit background.
• Yarn Over (YO): Creates the openwork lace holes that are essential to the shawl's delicate appearance and drape.
• Slip, Slip, Knit, Pass Slipped Stitches Over (S2kp): A centered double decrease that reduces stitches while maintaining symmetry in the lace pattern.
• Stitch Markers (SM): Used to delineate pattern sections and maintain stitch count accuracy throughout the project.

Pattern Structure

The shawl follows a repeating pattern sequence that builds the triangular shape. The Basic Pattern is worked in 13-row repeats, alternating between two yarn colors (Rose Quartz and Vintage from the Freia Fine Handpaints Ombré Shawl Ball collection). The Fletchling Pattern sections interrupt the basic pattern at strategic intervals, creating the asymmetrical design element. Knitters work the Basic Pattern, then introduce the Fletchling Pattern rows, then return to the Basic Pattern, creating a balanced composition with sporadic visual breaks.

Materials

The Fletchling Shawl requires two skeins of yarn and essential notions:

• Yarn: One skein each of Freia Fine Handpaints Ombré Shawl Ball Fingering Merino in Rose Quartz and Vintage colorways. Each skein weighs 100 grams and provides approximately 430 yards, for a total of 860 yards of fingering-weight merino wool.
• Needles: One US 6 (4mm) circular needle measuring 32 inches or longer, worked flat in rows rather than in the round.
• Notions: Two stitch markers to track pattern repeats and a tapestry needle for finishing and weaving in ends.

Gauge and Sizing

The recommended gauge is 20 stitches and 38 rows over 4 inches in the pattern stitch. However, the pattern notes that gauge is not critical, as knitters work until they run out of yarn, making this an ideal project for stash-busting or for creating custom sizing. The finished dimensions will vary slightly based on individual gauge and needle choice, but the design maintains its integrity regardless of minor gauge variations.

Design Notes

The pattern includes helpful guidance for knitters who may miscalculate stitch counts during the Fletchling sections. Substituting a Slip 1, Knit 1, Pass Slipped Stitch Over (Slip1, K1, Psso)