Luxury Throw - A Beginner Ribber Project

Here's an afghan made on the ribber using English Rib, also known as half fisherman's rib. I've reversed the pattern from the knit to the purl side, every 20 rows, to make it reversible.

I was going fror the look of a luxury throw, the kind you see in decorator and gift shops, and specifically hoping for a very nice gift item. The beauty of this project comes from the yarn, so look for a luxury/novelty yarn but make sure it's thin enough to knit in full needle rib on your ribber, and double-check by making a good-size swatch. I used rayon chenille - which is elegant but not sturdy - that had over 2,000 yards per pound. In the video, look how skinny it is next to my hand.

The chenille I used was rather soft and floppy. Now the machine needs a thorough brushing and vacuuming, as it always does after any large project or any yarn that sheds. I am thinking you could use a very thin hairy yarn, or two or three strands of very, very thin yarn like 2/30 for color depth - experiment with your swatches. A few years ago I found some yarn that was half wool and half cashmere, which would be wonderful for this project.

You could make it bigger, especially for a man. Mine came out 35" x 54" with the width on the machine actually being the longer dimension - it grew width-wise as soon as it came off the machine, and that's the long side of the rectangle. I used a whole cone of yarn that I already had on hand. I might try this with all 110 needles for a longer throw.

The video had to be divided into two parts because I couldn't show everything and bring it in under ten minutes, but still, it's not too long.

Part 1 of 2:



Part 2 of 2: