Smocking Bandana Cowl

Great one skein project to show the beautiful colors of the yarn.

Do you know the feeling, when you’re in the yarn shop without any specific projects in mind and you grab the skein of the yarn because the colors are so appealing and the yarn is so soft, you can’t let it go? At the same time, your bank account says you shouldn’t buy any more yarn now. And you decide to get only 1 skein. Is anyone related to this situation?

So, I was at Charlotte Area Yarn Crawl a couple of years ago. It’s an event organized by several local yarn stores. It is a great time to support the stores, discover new stores, see some demos, attend classes and even win some prizes.

I think several stores in our area carry Malabrigo Rios yarn, but in one of the stores, I saw this color 416 Indiecita, and I just wanted it.

Later, when I started to play with different stitch patterns, I realized that this yarn needed some extra texture in the fabric to show all the beautiful colors. The smocking stitch pattern was what I was looking for.

And looking at how this stitch pattern builds, adding some elements to the project with 2x2 and 4x2 ribbing was my natural choice.

The idea for the pattern was to create a small accessory using 1 skein of Malabrigo Rios and using a smocking stitch pattern for the front and ribbing for the rest of the project. I like cowls and especially bandana style cowls with a longer front and shorter back. That is how the Smocking Bandana Cowl was born.

The cowl works top down in the round. To create a longer front the pattern uses short rows, for this section knitting will be flat (back and forth). The pattern uses German short rows, but you can substitute other types of short rows if you like. The increasing parts use my favorite types of increases - lifted increases, left and right. If you need to refresh or learn some techniques that I describe in the pattern, you can find extra links to several helpful Youtube tutorials.

Speaking about tutorials. When I published the pattern back in November 2020, I just added links to different tutorials from different people. Later, as I started publishing more and more patterns, I decided it was time to explore, how to make my own tutorials, and I added some photo tutorials to some patterns. But I wanted also to try to make videos.

And my first attempt was to show how to make a smocking stitch, which I used for Smocking Bandana Cowl.

I know, the video is not perfect, but probably everyone’s first try looks way different from what they expected. And it definitely gave me ideas on how to improve, what I need to change, and where I should pay more attention. Anyway, here is the tutorial, Smocking Stitch Cluster.

To make this project you’ll need:

One skein of yarn Malabrigo Rios, 100% Merino wool, 210 yds (192 m)/100 grams, or other worsted weight yarn with similar yardage. If you knit loose, you probably will need more than one skein, make sure you have extra yarn on hand. Or if you would like to stay in 1 skein yardage you’ll need to have a gauge as close as possible to the pattern gauge, don’t forget to block your swatch.

Circular needles size US 8 (5 mm) length 16” (40 cm) and optional length 24” (60 cm). It is possible to work only on circular 16” (40 cm) but after some increases, you’ll have enough stitches to spread over longer needles. So it’s up to you, to change to longer, or continue on shorties.

You also will need markers in 3 different colors (the pattern uses 1 magenta, 2 blue, 3 red) and a tapestry needle.

Here is the pattern

Smocking Bandana Cowl on Ravelry

Smocking Bandana Cowl on Payhip

Please if you’re sharing your finished projects on social media tag me @natalia_yarncraft and use the hashtag #SmockingBandanaCowl