Nuvem

1559 meters of yarn and thousands of simple knit stitches turned into this delightfully modern shawl. It's basically a very simple pattern, Nuvem by Martina Behm, and the challenge comes from the sheer number of stitches, not from complexity. The size and construction also require more needle than your average shawl. It's started from the middle with Judy's Magic cast-on, which I did with two 40" (roughly 100 cm) circular needles. When the narrow ends were rounded enough, I switched to just one 40" needle, which was just enough until the beginning of the ruffle, which doubles the amount of stitches. At that point I switched to a ridiculous 80" (about 205 cm) circular needle which I custom ordered from Signature Needle Arts some months ago when I first started planning on this project. That many stitches meant that each round of the ruffle took about 1½ hours to complete, and the bind-off took almost 3 hours. Moving the stitches around that kind of a circumference started to be a bit of a drag, literally. I think a stiffer and more slippery cable would have been better suited for this purpose, but it was manageable.

The yarn is Wollmeise Lacegarn, a turquoise skein labelled Neptun dark under the We're Different sticker. The shawl took up most of the 300 gram skein with just 8 grams remaining. Tackling the 1600 meters of yarn in one single skein was a challenge on its own. I managed to wind it into one solid cake, but barely. The plastic yarn winder was making some sounds of protest, and, when tightly wound, the skein almost touched the yarn guide in the end. After that experience I placed an order for a more heavy-duty winder to cater to my growing collection of Wollmeise Lacegarn.

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