Sunday, January 9, 2011

Day 9 and the Filet Weave

Edit: Just put in a much better photo! It's hard keeping up to quota!

Filet crochet. Just a grid, but use a whole bunch of scraps to weave back and forth through that grid and you've got something special! Maybe instead I should have called this the glam boho rock scarf.

Pick a smooth yarn and a hook that matches. You'll recognize this basic 1 chain filet pattern right away. Light worsted and a G hook or worsted and an H hook both will give good results.
Chain 24.
row 1: Dc into 5th chain from hook. *ch 1, skip 1 ch, dc into next ch* to the end of the row. Turn.
row 2: Ch 4, *Dc into next dc, ch 1* repeat to the end of the row. Turn.
Repeat row 2 until your scarf is the desired length.

Now grab a tapestry needle and all of the crazy novelty yarn scraps you can lay your hands on. It doesn't matter if they match or not. Absolutely any combination will end up looking great in the end. I'm not exaggerating here. ANY yarn with ANY other yarn. I ended up using 18 different yarns for this project. No two are the same. Best of all you only need a scrap as long as your scarf. 6 feet, 8 feet, 10 feet. Scraps that you might not otherwise be able to use, but were too much of a hoarder like me to get rid of will have a home.

Start weaving the long way. Use as many yarns as you like. I find that if you hold 3 or 4 yarns together, you get a nice full fringe and your grid doesn't look too empty.

Finishing is a 3 step process.
1) Knot your fringe together. If I patterned this right, you should have ten squares in your grid so each fringe will have a pair with which to be knotted.
2) Trim your fringe. Do it sloppily if you like. I think all the different yarns look best when they aren't perfectly straight across.
3) Knot again. This time you'll be taking the very tip of each yarn and tying an overhand knot to prevent fraying. If you used all smooth yarns, you might be able to skip this step. If you used novelty yarns, especially lots of boucles or eyelash or yarns with a metallic bit would around the outside, you'll need to prevent those guys from unraveling.

I'll definitely be making more of these. I love this look!

2 comments:

  1. Oooh I love this one! In fact I think this will be perfect for a gigantor skein of novelty mash-up yarn I bought a few years ago. It has just about every kind of hot pink novelty yarn you can imagine tied together in 3-ft pieces. Thanks for the inspiration!

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