My sister joined Janis in approving the idea, so I went back to thinking seriously about it yesterday. What follows may suffer from bad arithmetic.
Sharon Miller did the Princess shawl in "DMC Crochet cotton #70". I think I found a source for that -- she doesn't sell it herself, and I couldn't find the little twist of cotton she sent me once for swatching. If arithmetic serves, the finished shawl would weigh 260 grams. She says that that is a "thicker and more durable" thread than the one used in the original shawl presented to Alexandra, Princess of Wales and that her pattern would benefit from being done in even finer yarn. Ouch.
SM sells an Italian-spun fine merino in which the finished shawl would weigh 300 grams. Since cotton is intrinsically heavier than wool, the wool yarn is almost certainly coarser.
Janis suggested a yarn called "soy infinity" which I had never heard of, and which is very tempting. Three cones of that would probably be enough, and would bring the shawl in again at 300 grams.
I have some suri alpaca which I bought from Cherry Tree Hill at Stitches East in, I think, '02. It's wonderful, and feels weightless. I looked that up, just for comparison (I don't think it's available in white) -- the shawl would weigh 500 grams. (I mean to make an Orenberg with mine, but haven't got around to it.)
I suppose the next step is to order one ball of SM's merino and see how I get on with it, playing around a bit with needles and needle sizes. There remains the very serious question: can I do this?
Meanwhile the Clapotis is very near the decreases, but not quite there yet after all. Today, surely. Nor have I made much of any progress towards clearing the swift so I can use it to wind all those Merging Colours.
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