Here’s another UFO found in that stash – an unfinished chullo hat.

This hat is knit of Knitpicks Palette and was a kit. Here’s the Rav page for the Andean Chullo Hat pattern, which is still available. Here it is at Knitpicks. The kit, which isn’t available any longer, came with several balls of Palette – I’m thinking maybe 8 colours. Palette is a fingering weight wool, which comes in a lot of colours.

I remember the pattern being a bit of fun, as there were numerous motifs that you could place on any of the sections and knit in any combination of the colours to make your hat your own. Have a peek at the projects on Rav to see the many variations. Of course, I had to march the llamas around the hat, though they might have shown up better if I’d knit them in the white in the kit. It’s also possible I mucked up the decreases at the crown because the circumference does diminish very quickly. (?)

This hat stalled without the tassels, partly because of the chullo hat shown below. I didn’t knit this one – I bought it at the Mountain Equipment Co-op a billion years ago (give or take). (In the 90s there were a lot of South American knits available for sale.)

It’s knit of a yarn that seems a lot like Lopi Alafoss – but its special magic is that it’s lined with polar fleece. The mister grabs this hat whenever it’s really cold.

I meant to do the same with my chullo hat, but was stymied as to what shape to cut the pieces for the crown. Now I realize that the creator of this hat avoided that challenge by only lining the main part of the hat and the flaps. I’ll do that with mine.

We also have a couple of chullo hats from one of the mister’s trips to South America. He hiked the Inca Trail back in the day (to end up at Machu Picchu at dawn) and it was so cold that he bought two hats from the local knitters. Both are chullos. He wore this navy one.

He bought this second hat just because, and I’m glad he did. It’s so beautiful.

The wool is so fine, it’s almost thread. Look at the detail.

Someone had a very fine set of needles! I love that the colour placement is apparently random. It’s such a lovely piece of work – and very inspiring.

And here, finally, is my own lined and finished chullo.