Here’s a project from Victorian Lace Today that was never documented on the blog. It’s a wide scarf—really, it’s a stole—and I knit it in Malabrigo Lace in the colourway Whale’s Tale. The pattern is the Alpine Knit Scarf with Double Rose Leaf Center Pattern and Diamond Border by Jane Sowerby.

My finished shawl is about 55″ long and 18″ wide.

There are several interesting details here. One is that photography often reveals colour shifts that aren’t as noticable in real life. Malabrigo Lace, like many handpainted yarns, has colour variations between skeins. I didn’t know anything about alternating skeins when I knit this and you can see, just a little past halfway and to the right, where I changed from one skein to the next. The left skein is a little bluer and the colours in the right skein are a little less blended.

You might also agree with the idea that lace shouldn’t be knit in yarns with color variations because it hides the detail of the lace. I kind of like it.

Here’s a shot of about half of the shawl (the right half above). Even in the handpainted yarn, you can see that this pattern has a border with a central panel in a different lace pattern, and that they’re separated (and edged) with garter stitch. The Malabrigo didn’t really pool in this knit, which was a nice bonus.

This is a beautiful pattern and I loved knitting it. Malabrigo Lace is very (very!) soft, too. I would like to knit it again in a more solid colour, just to see the difference.

You can see the pattern stitch a bit better in this older photo:

My Ravelry project page says I knit this in 2007! It’s been living in the cedar chest ever since. One of the good things about digging it out for a new photograph is that I’ve kept it out and am (finally) wearing it.