One thing I love about knitting are the structures and dimensions that are formed when working with something as flexible as yarn. How can I make something appear to be so ridged yet soft and flowing? For this design, I envisioned an intricate cable panel to be the strong central foundation for an otherwise simple draping shawl.

This shawl begins with a garter tab cast on. A small tab or rectangle is created in garter stitch, then stitches are picked up along 3 of the edges to create the beginning set-up row. If you have not started with this method before, there are many tutorials available online and I recommend practicing it a few times. There are extra rows in this patterns garter tab cast on, compared to others, to provide enough stitches for the cable panel.

Unlike most top-down triangular shawls where the increases are made on the right side of the work, this pattern increases the stitches on the wrong side. This is so the background purl stitches are on the same side as the cable stitches and help create the dimensional look.

In this pattern I provide instructions for the garter tab cast on, as well as the initial cable panel set up. The pattern is then a basic repeat of several rows. It concludes with an easy finish section and bind off. I have included the amount of repeats for the shawl pictured, however you may make your shawl as long or short as you wish. Since this pattern is easily adaptable - the yarn weight, needle size and gauge are all suggestions and I encourage you to be creative in trying different yarn weights or needles sizes!