Star Scarf

Continuing my obsession with small neckwear, Star Scarf is a more necktie than shawlette.

It's a long thin shape with pointy ends. The bold two colour effect is achieved with simple short rows.

The pattern is designed by Tori Yu and available to buy on Ravelry or as a digital pattern in the Pittenweem shop.

You have a choice of long (107cm) or short (76cm) and 4ply or DK.

I made mine the longer length with Socks Yeah DK.

Star Scarf long length worn with Caine

Star Scarf is knitted lengthways so you do have to cast on a lot of stitches. But because you use short rows to create the colour effect you are very rarely knitting all the stitches in each row.

With short rows you don't knit all the stitches on the needles. You simply knit to a specified point then turn and knit back along the row.

There are different ways to do short rows. These different ways aim to solve the problem of the gap created when you turn your knitting mid row.

This pattern uses one of the simplest methods - Wrap & Turn. The pattern explains clearly how to do this.

Wrap & Turn is a good method with garter stitch as you don't need to 'resolve' the wrap. The wrap just looks like a garter stitch bump.

If we were doing Wrap & Turn on stocking stitch we'd have to knit the wrap with the stitch. Not hard to do, but just another step you don't need to do here.

To keep track of where you are turning and wrapping the designer has you place stitch markers onto your needles between stitches. This not only reduces the amount of counting you have to do but also provides a visual reference to where you are in the pattern.

This is an excellent project to get to know short rows and gain some experience using stitch markers.

And don't be put off with the long cast on.

I hate casting on lots of stitches, but the actual knitting is more varied.

You start knitting all the stitches then with each row you knit less and less before changing colour and knitting more and more stitches.

I would recommend you make your cast on neat and fairly stretchy. Not too stretchy! You don't want a flare along one edge.

I followed the designer's instructions and used the Long Tail Cast On.

You can see video tutorials at Purl Soho showing the two methods - thumb and slingshot.

I also cast off loosely. But not too loosely! Just take your time and be aware of how tight you make each cast off stitch. Keep it consistent.

I was doing so well but ended up pulling the finally three stitches too tightly and blunted the point on the short end of my scarf.

In terms of yarn usage, Star Scarf is a fantastic stash buster.

For this long DK version you only need about 55m of each colour. About 25g of a wool DK.

For a long 4ply version you only need about 64m of each colour.

For blocking, I soaked in Eucalan, drained and squished out excess water then laid out flat to dry, straightening edges and the pointy short ends.

Obviously I put together some colour combos using our Socks Yeah DK range and our new Schoppel Wolle Senior yarn, a soft pure wool 4ply that comes in 25g cakes.

You can go high contrast or more tonal with your colour choice.