This extreme crescent shawl was inspired by the Op Art piece Blaze by Bridget Riley. Slanted lines of eyelets change directions, giving the illusion of concentric rotating circles.

This pattern was written to be offered as a shawl knitting class, and includes the following common shawl techniques:

• garter tab start with provisional cast on
• pattern repeats
• knitting from charts
• stitch exceptions
• knitting with beads
• stretchy bind off

The pattern uses very slightly less than one skein (600 yards) of Interlacements Irish Linen. Gauge is not critical, but failure to get gauge may require use of a second skein to finish the project. You may also wish to pull out your gauge swatch and use that yarn for the project.

Beads are included near the outer edge of the piece, and are completely optional. Knitters who choose to use beads will need 170 size 6˚ (or larger) seed beads to complete the pattern as charted. A tiny (steel size 8 or 10) crochet hook is needed to place the beads.

The geometric design of the lace makes it a fine non-gendered shawl.

While the yarn specified is a warm-weather yarn, I’d love to see this knit up in cool-weather yarn (wool, alpaca), and especially something thicker, like a worsted weight. If you do so, PLEASE make sure you link your project to this pattern page and include pictures!

This shawl is being offered as a class in November 2016 at The Yarn Stop in Clawson, MI. If you’d like to use the pattern for a class at your shop, please message me through Ravelry.

Thanks to the students in my class, who found a big mistake in the pattern. The PDF has been updated to version 1.1. If you have a previous version, please download this one. The only change is to the setup section on page 3.