What could be more elegant than diamonds and circles? This shawl features several diamond motifs charted by Dorothy Reade in the 1960s for a book she was working on. The unpublished manuscript was given to me by her daughter, when I was working on research for my own book, Successful Lace Knitting: Celebrating the Work of Dorothy Reade. Dorothy was so prolific, that it was impossible for me to include all of her work in that book.

Here, I present a collection of motifs that have hitherto been unpublished. Although some may seem familiar to you—because they have undoubtedly been “unvented” by many designers over the years —I’ve used Dorothy Reade’s hand-written notes and hand-drawn charts to knit this sample.

The pi-shawl general design was unvented by Elizabeth Zimmermann and it makes creating lace shawls so easy! Each section is worked even with increases in between, doubling the number of stitches in a mathematical formula that creates pleasing dimensions.

The yarn I used was hand-dyed and may only be available undyed commercially. Yarn substitution choices:

My first choice would be Handmaiden Sea Silk.

Other options could be:
Handmaiden Swiss Silk
Saffron Dyeworks Splendore
Fibres d’art Mulberry Silk Fingering
Blackberry Ridge Pure Silk Fingering Weight 2-ply
Shinyyy Pure silk fingering

Also it could be made in any merino-silk or cashmere-silk blend for a softer, slightly less lustrous/drapey version.