Armi Scarf – Free Knitting Pattern

I found myself wanting a slightly longer scarf – something I could wrap over my head to protect my ears when needed, or wear over a light spring coat as a small detail.

That's how the Armi scarf came to life. A simple, soft, and versatile piece that I now want to share with you. For the Armi scarf you will need 50 g of fingering weight yarn, 25 g of lace weight yarn (such as silk mohair) and approx. 10 g of any fingering weight yarn for stripes. For my sample, I used Sandnes Garn Sunday and Knitting for Olive Soft Silk Mohair.

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The idea behind the scarf is that by adding some scrap yarn, you can make it a bit longer than if you only used one skein of fingering weight yarn. And we knitters all have scrap yarns hidden in our closets, don't we?

The scarf is knitted on 3.75mm-4mm needles with two strands (fingering and silk mohair) throughout, except for the stripes which are worked with only one strand of fingering weight yarn to enhance the contrast (and also so you don't have to hunt for matching silk mohair yarn).

Here is a my pattern for the Armi scarf (I took the liberty of using abbreviations that are easily found by googling if you're not familiar with them)

Armi scarf

The scarf is knitted from corner to corner. Work begins at one tip, increasing stitches until the widest part of the scarf is reached, after which the work is decreased back to the other tip.

Stripes are knitted into the scarf with a contrasting color. The yarns are carried along the edge of the work, so there's no need to cut them. However, if the contrast is too strong and the yarn on the edge bothers you too much, you can cut the contrasting yarn and carry the short strand along the edge for a few rounds, weaving it into your work as you go. 

Increases and decreases are intentionally made immediately after the first stitches as part of the edge construction.

Abbreviations

k = knit
p = purl
RS = right side
WS = wrong side
sm = slip marker
M1L = make one left (lift the strand between the stitches from the front onto the left needle and knit it through the back loop)
k2tog tbl = knit two stitches together through the back loops.

Cast on

Cast on 6 sts.

Row 1 (WS): Purl all stitches.

Row 2 (RS): Slip 1 st purlwise with yarn in back, k1, place sm, M1L, (knit to next marker), place sm, slip 1 st purlwise with yarn in front, k1, slip 1 st purlwise with yarn in front.

Row 3 (WS): k1, slip 1 st purlwise with yarn in front, k1, sm, purl remaining stitches.

Repeat Rows 2–3 until you have 36 sts.

Stripes

Continue increasing in the same manner during the stripe section.

Knit stripes as follows: alternate 2 rows with contrasting color and 2 rows with main color, for a total of 18 rows.

Note! On stripe rows, always knit 1 stitch at the beginning of the right side and carry all yarns along the edge of the work.

Continue until there are a total of 5 contrasting color stripes.

Then continue with the main color, knitting rows 2 and 3 as normal. 

When you have 64 stitches, change color again at the beginning of the next row and continue the stripe pattern for the next 18 rows according to the instructions above. 

Continue with the main color as usual, rows 2 and 3, until you have 83 stitches. This is the widest point of the scarf. Once you reach 83 stitches, stop increasing and begin decreasing on the next right-side row.

Decreases

Begin decreases and knit as follows:

Row 4 (RS): Slip 1 st purlwise with yarn in back, k1, sm, k2tog tbl, knit to next marker, place sm, slip 1 st purlwise with yarn in front, k1, slip 1 st purlwise with yarn in front.

Row 5 (WS): k1, slip 1 st purlwise with yarn in front, k1, sm, purl remaining stitches.

Continue knitting rows 4 and 5, and repeat the 5-stripe contrasting stripe sections when you have 74 sts and 46 sts, but now always decreasing at the beginning of the right-side row.

Continue until 6 sts remain.

Bind off

Slip 1 st purlwise with yarn in back, k1 and pass the slipped stitch over. Repeat 3 times. Slip 1 st back to the left needle and knit it and the next stitch together through their back loops. Repeat until 1 st remains on the needle. Cut the yarn and pull it through the last stitch, then weave in the ends invisibly along the edge of the scarf.

Hope you like your Armi scarf! If you wish, you can share a picture of your Armi scarf on social media with #armihuivi #armiscarf and perhaps brighten your knitting friend's day by sharing this free scarf pattern with them.

This is a free pattern and has not been technically edited. The pattern may contain errors, which will be corrected in this text later. If you wish, you can add your corrections to the comment field; thank you in advance for your help! 

Happy knitting!

Else/Armi yarns