Llosa

The Llosa shawl is a simple triangular shawl. You start at one tip, increase gradually until the middle of the shawl and, from there, work the decreases to the opposite tip. In this shawl we play with colour to create squares: knit with two strands held together, changing the colour of one strand every set number of stitches or rows. This produces squares in different shades and a shawl that’s very easy and enjoyable to knit.

In Asturias, the region of Northern Spain where I’m from, a “llosa” is a group of farmland plots in which each neighbour has their own patch.

GAUGE

14 st and 28 rows = 10 cm / 4 inches in garter stitch, before blocking. We’ll stretch it slightly during blocking.

Tension isn’t critical for this shawl, but it may affect the amount of yarn you need and the finished measurements.

MEASUREMENTS

After blocking: approximately 200 cm / 79 inches long and 45 cm / 18 inches wide at the widest point.

YARN

We’ll use two strands held together throughout the shawl. One strand comes from the ball we’ll use for each “vertical” column (i.e. it’s used in each column of squares throughout the length of the shawl), and the other strand comes from the ball we’ll use for the “horizontal” bands (i.e. it’s used for each new colour band across the width of each row).

I used six balls in total (but not fully – see quantities below): 3 colours × 2 balls per colour, one for the vertical columns and the other for the horizontal bands. I’d recommend using three different colours for the vertical columns, and you can either use the same three for the horizontal bands or use scrap yarn to make each band a different colour.

YARN WEIGHT

Two strands of lace-weight yarn held together. I used De Rerum Natura Bérénice (55% mohair, 25% silk, 20% merino). As we’re knitting with 6 mm (US 10) needles, you can combine various weights – lace + fingering, two strands of fingering, fingering + sport, lace + sport, two strands of sport, etc. – but the colours blend more subtly when you use a yarn with a halo, such as mohair, alpaca, etc.

COLOURS AND YARDAGE

• 🤎 Colour 1 (I used Cacao – brown): a 210 m / 230 yd ball and a 135 m / 148 yd ball.
• 🩷 Colour 2 (I used Argile – pink): a 136 m / 149 yd ball and a 135 m / 148 yd ball.
• 🧡 Colour 3 (I used Erable – orange): a 48 m / 52 yd ball and a 140 m / 153 yd ball. For this colour you should have enough with a typical 25 g ball, but you’ll need to split it into two.

If you want to use scrap yarn for the different bands you’ll need anything from 9 m / 10 yd for the corners up to 57 m / 62 yd for the widest part. All this is explained in more detail in the pattern but the amounts above is what you need if you want to make it just like mine.

How to buy the pattern

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If you'd prefer to buy the pattern on Ravelry, follow this link: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/llosa