I love Shakespeare comedies. Even though they are predictable, and (in the current liberated climate) dreadfully un-PC, there is just something universally appealing about the Bard’s sense of humor. Throw in a few cross-dressing women, add some gender-bending repartee and sneak in a practical joke or two and you just can’t go wrong.

I also love to make and wear well-fitting shawls. Unfortunately I find so many patterns (including several of my own) are beautiful when they are flat but put them on and they bunch and gather. If I spend untold hours creating a wrap, I want my work to actually show!

When I created the structure used for all the shawlettes in this series –a half-circle which conforms lovingly to the shoulders– I knew I needed to dedicate the series to Good Old Bill’s ladies. Like the comedies, the framework is the same for all the shawls but each has its own unique pattern.

Both written and charted formats are provided.

About Hero
Difficulty: Intermediate

Sweet and charming Hero has a life fit for a modern day soap opera. She adores Claude, but her father wants an alliance with Claude’s boss Don Pedro who is a prince. Fortunately Don Pedro decides to help the course of true love along and fixes it so Claude and Hero can marry. However, when the wedding day arrives, Don Pedro’s scheming younger brother convinces Claude that Hero has been, well, a very naughty girl indeed. Scandal, chaos, and drama ensue and the wedding becomes a funeral instead. It seems so dramatic, but in the end, it was all Much Ado About Nothing.

As Hero’s love life is not under her own control the central band of stitches is gradually maneuvered in one direction, then the other, by events (stitches) that happen along side it. The lace is worked only on the right side rows and follows an easily predictable course—something Shakespeare was known for in his comedies.