Shawls are quickly becoming my new favorite piece to design. They were originally inspired by the gorgeous wraps in the knitting world, but now I’m focused on exploring all of the techniques and possibilities crochet has to offer. From using new stitches to playing with shapes and color, the possibilities are truly endless.
I’m so excited to share the Serenity Shawl, the latest design from TL Yarn Crafts. Serenity’s story starts on my NYC trip where I finally met Casey of Prem Knits in person. I’d been following Casey on Instagram for ages and was always inspired by her unique and vibrant premium hand-dyed yarns. When I had the chance to meet her at Vogue Knitting Live, her positive energy and good vibes convinced me that we needed to work together.
After some messaging back and forth, Casey and I landed on a DK weight yarn base, but I asked her to surprise me with the color. Then 4 skeins of the most gorgeous yarn showed up in the mail. The color is called TL Turquoise and Casey’s couldn’t have captured the TLYC spirit better than with this color. The full shawl uses about 410 yards of TL Turquoise #1 and the same amount of TL Turquoise #2, a slightly darker shade of #1. The two colors together along with the tonal nature and speckled shadows of the yarn results in a subtle faded quality that I can’t get enough of. Keep scrolling for more details on my design process, and purchase the PDF pattern here.
Truth time: My original designs with this gorgeous yarns were… unsuccessful. I felt like I was forcing the making process. I spent nearly a week swatching and ripping out my samples. I finally took a deep breath, did a little yoga, made some mint tea and tried again. And the pattern started to flow. The name Serenity didn’t come to me until after the shawl design was complete. The journey of designing this gorgeous shawl reminded me that I need to honor the process of expressing my creativity and respect my materials. I’m not a machine – and I shouldn’t treat my process like a production line. I am an artist and I’m blessed to work with such beautiful supplies.
My heart is so full of joy with this pattern release and I’m happy to share that Casey has dyed yarn to accompany this project! You can find a limited run of 4 hand-dyed yarn packs on her website, www.PremKnits.com.
I will always have fond memories of how the Serenity Shawl came to be. This collaboration with Casey and Prem Knits was the stuff dreams are made of. I hope you’ll join me in celebrating crochet by making your own Serenity Shawl.
I would consider this an Intermediate level pattern. While the stitches are familiar, the structure of the rows, especially the picot and border rows, can get a little tricky. Take your time and enjoy the process.
Find the Serenity Shawl pattern in the Etsy and Ravelry shops, and on TLYarnCrafts.com.
Don’t forget to share your works-in-progress and finished shawls with me on Instagram using the hashtag #SerenityShawl.
Hey, Toni!
So, a quick question that maybe you could help me with. That first picot section . . . I’m to the trebles, but for whatever reason, I’m landing on a treble one stitch *before* the ch 2 space. The pattern says up to the ch 2 space, but even after frogging back and fixing what I thought was wrong, I still end up with an extra stitch before the ch 2. Is that right, or are my counts wrong maybe a little further back than I think? I’m looooving this shawl so far, but being one off is making me a little crazy, lol.
Thanks so much!!
Hi Danielle! It might be that your count is off a little higher up in the shawl. Which is ok! If it won’t drive you completely crazy, keep going and just fudge it a little bit. The overall effect will be the same 🙂