I was paging through Japanese stitch dictionaries and found the main pattern used in this cowl. It reminded me of an Egyptian cartouche and I visualized it in a deeper vibrant red. That design, Cartouche Shawl, was published in Knitty, Winter 2011. I’ve since used these stitch patterns in the Cartouche Slouchy Beret and the Cartouche Stole; however, I still wasn’t done with this design and knew that I wanted to do a cowl and fingerless gloves to complete the set.

The Cartouche Cowl begins with a provisional cast on and the piece is worked along the circumference and then the two ends are grafted together. The border pattern are slightly modified from the one used in the Cartouche Stole so, if you’ve knit already knit that piece, you’ll want to pay extra attention to the final few rows of the chart.

Pattern is 10 pages.

Skills Required:

• Increasing and decreasing
• Following charts
• Cables
• Lace
• Twisted Stitches
• Blocking

Finished Size (blocked): 10”/25.4 cm wide by 27 (54)”/68.58 (137.16) cm circumference

Other Tools:

• Stitch markers: 8
• Cable needles: 2
• Waste yarn and crochet hook, size USG/6 (4.00 mm) or larger for provisional cast on
• Fine cotton thread in contrasting colour for life-lines
• Tapestry needle
• Glow line tape (to mark current row on chart/instructions - optional)
• Blocking wires and Tpins

Skill Level: Intermediate to Advanced

Yarn: 317 (634) yards/290 (580) meters of wool or merino DK weight yarn that knits up to 5.5 sts/inch.

Shown In: Estelle ‘Eco Andean DK Wool’, (350 yards/320 meters; 100% merino; 3.53 oz/100 grams per skein), 1 skein in colour 004, size short.

Other Possible Yarns:

• Baa ram ewe ‘Dovestone DK’, (252 yards/230 meters; 50% Blue Faced Leicester, 25% Masham/Massam, 25% Wensleydale; 3.53 oz/100 grams per skein).
• Garnstudio DROPS Karisma Superwash’, (109 yards/100 meters; 100% Wool; 1.76 oz/50 grams per skein).
• Rowan ‘Tweed’, (129 yards/118 meters; 100% Wool; 1.76 oz/50 grams per skein).
• Elsebeth Lavold ‘Silky Wool’, (192 yards/175 meters; 45% Wool, 35% Silk, 20% Nylon; 1.76 oz/50 grams per skein).

Hard (paper) copies of this pattern may be available from your local yarn shop. Please contact them for more details.