My nephew recently married. His bride is of Indian heritage, Gujarati the language spoken by her family. In my own family, we draw names at Christmas, and I drew the name of his wife, Puja. Puja translates to a blessing, and she is a blessing to my nephew. I decided to create a cowl for her using her favorite colors and two Gujarati embroidery motifs, translated to knit. The allover design is a riff on the “Kutch” embroidery stitch, the floral motif I found repeated on many different garments. I hope she likes it and that I haven’t gone too far off the mark from the original motifs. I will add this cowl to my WORLD CULTURES collection. I love translating cultural motifs to knit!

For this cowl, I used three colors, but two colors would work just as nicely! Applied Icord edging is optional (see top right photo above), but gives a nice finished look and makes the cowl “stand up” beautifully. I love the Cascade 220 color called JET, so I used it for the Main Color. The other 2 colors are 220 Merino Superwash. They mix just fine, but if you are a stickler for all yarns being exactly the same, substitute BLACK in the 220 Merino Superwash.
Needles are slightly smaller than normally used for the weight, but I like the fabric to be a bit tighter than normal. A US size 7 or 8 needle is fine for a less dense fabric, a US size 4 or 5 for a tighter fabric. Cowl shown in photos is NO TWIST.

Materials:
MC 280 yds Cascade 220 Superwash Merino BLACK
OR (in photo) Cascade 220 JET
CC1 180 yds Cascade 220 Superwash Merino RASPBERRY
(yardage includes applied Icord edge)
CC2 140 yds Cascade 220 Superwash Merino TEAL
2 yd length and 12 inch length contrasting waste yarn for provisional cast ons

US Size 6 / 4mm Circular 16 inch needle (a second set will be needed for grafting ends)
US Size 6 / 4mm DPNs (only 2 needed for Applied Icord Edging)

Gauge: (not critical, but here it is) 5.5 sts per inch

Finished Measurements:
Length: approximately 60 inches / 152cm
Width: approximately 6 inches / 15 cm including applied Icord edge, 5-5.5 inches / 13-14 cm without edge.