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Quick As A Wink Cowl
Cast on Ksenia Naidyon’s super simple Quick As A Wink Cowl pattern as you press play on your favorite holiday movie, and you’ll be binding off before the credits roll!
Your ticket for last-minute gifts or instant knitting gratification, this cowl is as easy as it gets. Just rows of garter stitch with a color swap for fun, then bind off and seam your ends together… And you’ve made something stunning in a flash!
Ksenia designed this cowl with a generous height, which makes it, as she says, “a dream to style: as a hood, a shoulder warmer, or, of course, a cowl with some extra cozy folds.”
All this lightning-fast beauty could only come from one place: Our bountiful, super-bulky Gentle Giant yarn!
Gentle Giant is a magnificent single ply of 100% merino wool, plump and lofty and just incredibly soft! Its beautiful halo glows in the winter light, and its cozy abundance is wonderful to wear.
It only takes three skeins of Gentle Giant to cast on for this cowl, so pick up yarn for a few, and you’ll have a stack of amazing gifts… quick as a wink!
Yarn lovers, if you adore the yarn used in this project, you’ll love exploring all of our other yarn collections! Discover over 45 thoughtfully designed yarns in nearly every natural fiber and in every spectacular color you can imagine. Only available here at Purl Soho’s online yarn store, where every skein is created with care and your creativity in mind!
Designed for Purl Soho by Ksenia Naidyon, the talented designer behind Life Is Cozy, where she shares patterns for her beautiful hand knits, instructions for must-know stitch patterns, and reviews on needles, books, and notions… Everything we knitters love!
Want to print this pattern? On desktop, find the “print” icon in the right margin, and on mobile, scroll to the end of the pattern for it. Use the on-screen instructions to remove anything you don’t want to print!
Materials
- Purl Soho’s Gentle Giant, 100% merino wool yarn. Each skein of this super bulky yarn is 48 yards/ 125 grams.
- Main Color (MC): 2 skeins; approximately 96 yards required
- Contrast Color (CC): 1 skein; approximately 48 yards required
- US 17 (12 mm), 32-inch circular needles
We used these colors for our samples… (NOTE: Some colors are no longer available)
MC Heirloom White + CC Super Pink
MC White Peppercorn + CC Graphite Gray
MC Winter Bark + CC Heirloom White
MC Calico Pink + CC Cowrie Pink
GAUGE
8 stitches and 16 rows = 4 inches in garter stitch
SIZE
Finished Dimensions: Approximately 24 inches in circumference x 13 inches high
PATTERN
With Main Color, cast on 26 stitches using a basic Long Tail Cast On.
Row 1 (wrong side): Slip 1 knitwise with yarn in back, knit to end of row.
NOTE: Use a removable stitch marker, safety pin, or piece of scrap yarn to mark the next row as a right-side row.
Repeat Row 1 until piece measures approximately 8 inches from cast-on edge, or if using Gentle Giant, until you have used all of the first skein of MC, ending with a wrong-side row.
*Next Row: With Contrast Color (CC), knit to end of row.
Continuing with CC, repeat Row 1 for approximately 8 inches, or if using Gentle Giant, until you have used as much of CC as you can, ending with a wrong-side row.
Repeat from * with second skein of MC, ending with a right-side row and several yards left over.
Bind-Off Row (wrong side): Bind off all stitches knitwise, leaving a couple yards for seaming.
SEAMING
Fold piece in half, wrong sides together, aligning bind-off and cast-on edges. With bind-off edge in front, thread bind-off tail onto a tapestry needle and sew edges together using a whipstitch. Sew the last stitch twice.
FINISHING
Weave in all the ends and gently steam block.
Share your progress and connect with the community by tagging your pics with #PurlSoho. We can’t wait to see what you make!
LEARN ABOUT GENTLE GIANT + ALL OUR BEAUTIFUL YARNS
You can’t get more gentle or more giant than Gentle Giant! A single ply of 100% merino wool, Gentle Giant has a loose and lofty spin that puts the fiber’s softness up front and also keeps this jumbo-weight yarn from weighing you down. You knit Gentle Giant up on mega US 17 or 19 (12-15 mm) knitting needles, making it a very smart choice for last-minute gifts that don’t sacrifice a lick of beauty!
More Knitting Patterns
- Be sure to explore our vast collection of (mostly free!) Gentle Giant knitting patterns and cast on!
More Jumbo-Weight Yarns
- Shop our collection of jumbo-weight yarns
- If you want to use a different yarn, be sure to take the time to get the correct gauge. Need help? Check our All About Gauge Tutorial and our Yarn Substitution article for lots of helpful information.
More Yarns With Similar Fibers
- Shop merino wool
Looking for more inspiration? Explore all of our knitting patterns (including tons of free knitting patterns) and knitting tutorials, buy one of our many knitting kits and yarn bundles, and shop for beautiful yarn. We have over 35 gorgeous natural fiber yarns in 100’s of magnificent colors, designed to bring integrity, beauty, and joy to your next knitting project and only available at Purl Soho!
Where are the instructions for the color block cowl? Not the border one, and what size needle?
Thanks
Hi Arlene,
We are so happy you are going to give this pattern a try! The Quick as A Wink Cowl uses US 17 (12 mm), 32-inch circular needles, and three skeins of our Gentle Giant yarn. If you scroll down past the photos, the pattern begins after the last two images of the blush color and beige color skeins of yarn. Please let me know if you have any other questions and I would be happy to help!
Happy knitting,
Gavriella
Hello, I was hoping to make this in the super soft merino with US 11 needles instead of the gentle giant (I thought it would not be so chunky and lay a little more floppy). I plan on making the color block version. Do you have advice for # to cast on with the super soft? or any other advice for the switch of yarn for this project?
Thank you!
Hi Jennifer,
Thank you for writing in! That sounds like a great idea! We would suggest starting with a gauge swatch. Once you have that, you can measure your stitches per inch and multiply that number by 13! This will give you your cast on number. After you have that number you will be able to follow the rest of the pattern instructions! I hope this helps but please let me know if you have any other questions!
Happy knitting,
Gavriella
I just got this Gentle Giant yarn and I love it! I see you all only have a few colors left. What are the chances you’ll get a restock with the original variety of colors?
Hi Liz,
Thanks for writing in! I’m afraid that only the currently available colors are still part of our line-up. For a similarly soft and fluffy alternative with more color options, I’d recommend using Super Soft Merino! This yarn is very similar to Gentle Giant in terms of fiber content and spin, but it is thinner, so you’d need to adjust the cast-on number for the cowl. Let me know if you’d like any assistance with that modification if you choose to use Super Soft Merino!
All the best,
Lili
Could I knit this on straight needles rather than circular ones?
Hi Elizabeth,
Thank you for asking. You could definitely knit this pattern on straight needles and then seam it up after! One thing to keep in mind is you will want to adjust your rounds for rows by reversing stitches for the wrong side.
Happy knitting!
Gavriella
Could I make this with Lovebird for the main color. If so what other yarn could I use for the contrast part that would work. How would I adjust the number of stitches to cast on etc. for the Chunky weight vs. Super Bulky?
Hi Elizabeth,
You could definitely use Lovebird for this pattern but you will need to make some slight modifications since that yarn is thinner than Gentle Giant. You will first want to knit a gauge swatch and measure your stitches per inch. You will then multiply that number by 13 to get your cast on number. From there you can follow the pattern as written. I’d recommend Pouf or Super Soft Merino as great yarns for your contrast color!
Happy knitting!
Gavriella
Can you make this cowl longer? If so how would I do that?
Hi Jennifer,
Sure! If you mean taller, then you would cast on more stitches, or if you mean wider, then you would knit more rows. Please let us know what exactly you have in mind, so we can more specifically give you instructions… We’re always happy to help!
Best,
Whitney
This pattern read as though knit on straight needles and then the ends are seamed together. Is there a circular needle pattern? Thanks
Hi Helen!
Thank you for your question! This pattern is worked on circular needles, but it’s knit flat and then seamed so the stitch direction runs horizontally rather than vertically. If you’d prefer to avoid seaming, you can absolutely use a provisional cast on and graft the ends together with Kitchener stitch instead.
And if you’d like a true knit-in-the-round option, our Mountain Capelet and Mountain Cowl patterns use the same yarn and might be great alternatives to explore!
Warmly,
Megan