Black Patchwork Scarf

A 90x180 cm rectangle, worn doubled or draped

Length is what decides how this scarf behaves. The long 90x180 cm rectangle doubles easily around the neck, as the photograph shows, and in that position only part of the pattern stays visible, so it sits quietly under a coat collar. Opened out across the shoulders it does the opposite: the whole width is on show and the piece becomes the thing people look at first.

Tied short over a shirt collar it turns into a small graphic detail; knotted loosely over a camel coat it carries the outfit on its own. Both short ends finish in short frayed fringing, drawn out of the weave rather than added on, so the edge is visible without adding any bulk. If a different shape suits the way you wear things, look at the triangle and snood shapes instead, which wrap in quite a different way.

Measurements, fabric and finish

Houndstooth, checks and stripes in black, cream and taupe

The print is not one motif repeated but several placed side by side. Blocks of houndstooth, checks and stripes follow one another, and the scale shifts from block to block: a wide houndstooth sits beside a tight check, a grey and white square meets a plain panel in cream or taupe. That change of scale, more than the motifs themselves, is what stops the fabric reading as a single print.

Black holds the backgrounds together, cream opens up the lighter squares, taupe bridges the two. The polyester keeps the printed edges crisp where one block meets the next, which matters on a design built entirely from joins. For other ways of handling print on the same kind of piece, browse other prints in the same range.

Gold dashes along the seams

Between some of the blocks runs a line of small gold dashes along the seams, spaced like stitches. They are not a pattern in their own right. They mark the joins and catch the light when the fabric moves, and they are the reason this piece does not read as a plain black and white patchwork. Worn in the evening they do the work a necklace would otherwise do; wound tightly for the office they disappear almost completely.