Now also available on Payhip!

A circular lace shawl with optional knitted-on edging, Treegarth will surround you with a lacey forest. This is a long-awaited labor of love, and we are very happy to finally be bringing the pattern to you.

The initial themes for this shawl, back in the very beginning, were leaves and safety. I chose a selection of traditional lace motifs, carefully picked to complement each other while providing variation. I tried to arrange them in ways that bear significance to me - a star of hope in the center, surrounded by gentle waves, and by leaves that first shelter inward and then bloom outward, all interspersed with enclosing rings of concentric garter stitch. The word ‘treegarth’ uses the archaic -garth ending to refer to an enclosed green space or a garden. I first stumbled across it in my early childhood love of Tolkien. It felt perfect to describe the sense of enclosure and peace and growth I intended this shawl to provide.

SIZING & VARIATIONS

For the original custom shawl, I ended the shawl after only six repeats of the blooming lace motif. Rather than a knitted-on edging, I finished around the entire shawl with a stretchy, loose bind off. This created a slightly more loose, organic edging, and suited her under-5’ frame perfectly. Both my personal sample and my test knitter finished out the pattern as written, complete with edging leaf lace. These shawls on the models you see in our pattern photography are around 5’7” and tend to wear sweaters knit to fit a 48” chest, for a size comparison.

Your own finished shawl can vary greatly in size depending on how firmly you block it, and your own finishing choices, but it’s designed to be a “full body” shawl. If you need to increase the size, rather than adding more repeats, I’d recommend sizing up the needles. The recommended gauge gives a rather close fabric; especially if you choose a heartier sock yarn, you could easily go up one or two needle sizes. Gauge is not crucial for this pattern.

YARN NEEDS

Both full-size, edged samples used approximately 1340 yards of yarn - the original “open-ended” shawl used just under 1200 yards. For the samples pictured, our yarn choices were-

Green shawl: Knit Picks Palette in Shire Heather, just under 6 balls ($)
Dark blue shawl: Cozy Hearth Yarn Works Heritage Sock in Gorm, just under 4 skeins ($$)
Blue-white faded shawl: Mountain Colors Twizzlefoot in one skein each of Turtle Lake, Bluebird, and Blueberry ($$$)

TOOLS

You will need US 5 circular needles (or the size that creates your preferred fabric), either in a variety of cable lengths up to 60” or with interchangable cords. Depending on your preferred small circumfrence knitting method, you may want to have some matching size DPNs on hand as well - I started both my shawls with DPNs, but my tester preferred using magic loop. You’ll also need a tapestry needle for weaving in ends, and a large, appropriate space and the necessary pins for blocking.

If you decide to embark on this lace adventure, please share your progress shots & finished shawls! You can do this either by linking the project on Ravelry or by using #treegarthshawl and #cozyhearthyarnworks. You are also welcome to tag our accounts directly on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, or Tumblr.