Echoes of Ironwood Shawl

Pattern available on Ravelry and Etsy.

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Oh hey! It's been a while, yeah?

Well. I'm back! And I'm back with a brand new pattern, too.

Meet Echoes of Ironwood, an extra-long striped triangular crochet shawl designed with three shades of green from Ethan Pyle of Refracted Light Fiber Arts, all of which were naturally dyed, by the way!

When Ethan first reached out to me about a collaboration, he was pretty open to ideas, but it didn't take much back and forth before we decided on sister shawls (one crocheted, one knit).

And it was a quick and easy yes for me when he suggested this gorgeous trio of greens!

Aren't they just delicious!?

We did use two skeins of the lightest green (Sprout) for both shawls.

I was super excited to get started working on a design with them, but my first swatch was just.... kind of meh. To me, anyway.

Especially after I saw what Ethan was working on!

I mean, just take a look at this incredible knit shawl:

Isn't it stunning!?

Nan-tathren is designed with the same three shades of green and uses tweed and brioche together in a modified kite shape.

If you'd like to learn more about Ethan's design, it's available on his website as well as on Ravelry.

So after Ethan shared his downright elegant looking swatch photo with me, I knew that I wanted something more from this design and I went back to the drawing board.

And I knew the next one was going to be a winner pretty quickly.

Here's my cute little swatch:

With fingering weight yarn, and increases only on one side, every other row, it took a LONG time to get to four inches wide!

55 Rows to be exact.

But those extra narrow long pointy ends are one of my favorite parts about this shawl because I can tie them in knots!

I love knots.

And I've always wanted a shawl with long pointy ends, but for some reason this is the first one I've published!

Here's another fun knot of sorts, if you want to wear it more like a scarf than a shawl:

What's your favorite way to style a long narrow shawl?

Or do you prefer shorter ones instead??

Speaking of which, let's take a look at some of my pattern testers' work!

Stashbuster by Toni Dufficy

DK Weight by Sandra

Ombre by NatalieAW

Shawlette by Marieke

Stashbusting Fade by Betty

DK Weight by Kamron Wiese

Shawlette by Christi

We had stashbusting and mini-skeins, shawlette sizes and heavier yarn weights, and even an ombre yarn! I really love seeing the colors other makers choose and what sort of modifications they are inspired to make when given the encouragement.

And boy did this bunch play! I absolutely loved it.

Many MANY thanks to everyone who gave this pattern a go and helped me shape it into the finished design, including Toni Dufficy, Sandra, NatalieAW, Marieke, Kamron Wiese, Betty, Liz, and Christi, as well as to my tech editor Sara Greer — I truly could not have brought this one to life without them!!

Here's what some of them had to say about Echoes of Ironwood:

This was a fun pattern to play with color. -Betty

The Echoes of Ironwood Shawl is a nice versatile project. It uses beginner friendly stitches in a unique way. Depending on the yarn you choose, it works up quickly. It is easy to have fun and modify the stripe patterns however you choose. I highly recommend this pattern! -Kamron Wiese

Echoes of Ironwood is a joy to crochet. There's easy stitches, some nice texture and stripes to keep your attention and a beautiful end result. Recommended! -Marieke

This is a relaxing and meditative project once you get going. -NatalieAW

So much versatility and flexibility in one design! Using a simple pattern repeat, the maker is invited to have fun and create a wrap that has the desired proportions, feel, drape, and number of stripes/color blocks. And a self striping yarn works as well as individual skeins. -Toni Dufficy

What a great bunch of testers they were! I really do love seeing all of their shawls. Great, great fun.

Okay.

Let's talk about some details, shall we?

STITCHES & TECHNIQUES:

• Single crochet

• Double crochet

• Front post double treble

• Decreases (defined in pattern)

GAUGE:

Rows 1–19 should measure approximately 4” (10 cm) long and 1.5” (4 cm) wide, unblocked.

Gauge is not critical; just make sure you like the feel of the fabric!

Finished measurements of original sample after blocking were 15” (38 cm) deep at the center point and 111” (282 cm) long.

SUGGESTED MATERIALS:

• Rivendell Fingering by Refracted Light Fiber Arts (100 g, 437 yds [400 m]), fingering weight (1: super fine) yarn, 100% Fine merino Wool (nonsuperwash), 4 skeins

o C1: Sprout (light green), 2 skeins

o C2: Peat (dark green), 1 skein

o C3: Verdant (bright green), 1 skein

• C/2 (2.75 mm) crochet hook

• stitch marker(s)

• scissors

• darning needle

I did not end up using ALL the yarn, by the way. My finished sample weighed 354 grams after washing, so that's... 1547 yards if I did my math right.

Here are my yummy leftovers that are definitely going to get turned into a hat or something!

You could absolutely adapt this pattern to use just three skeins of yarn instead of four, though; you'd just have to stop increasing a little earlier than I did (I would stop a little before halfway through your available yarn, just to play it safe).

Okay, I think that's about all I have to share about Echoes of Ironwood!

Oh. You know what? One more thing.

The pattern mentions the meaning behind the name, as both the colors and striping recalled for me the shifting light through the ironwood groves on Molokai.

Here's a photo from my trek up the mountainside:

If you haven't read about my time on Molokai, I invite you to join me on Patreon, where I shared my experience of being the Artist in Residence during the month of January of 2025 with a total of 17 photo heavy posts (includes another crochet design, actually).

It was one of the most impactful moments of my life, standing on that mountainside.

And this pattern is just one of many ways that Molokai has influenced my art.

I really hope you enjoy making this shawl! She was a labor of love and filled with so much joy and meditative reflection. And lots of spreadsheets, lol. Which I do share with you! There are two charts you can download along with the written instructions, one of which is blank if you'd like to fill in your own colors. (That was a tester request, in fact.)

The pattern is available on Ravelry as well as in my Etsy shop.

And please don't forget to tag me @crochetcetera on socials (I mostly use Instagram) if you share what you create! It makes my day to see your WIP and FO photos of my designs. Every single time.

Cheers!