How to Knit a Tentacle Scarf with Pockets

Yaaargh! It be the a curs'd KRAKEN!

I have a bit of a thing for tentacles.

That sounded far dirtier than it was supposed to. All I mean is, tentacles are cool. It’s a steampunk/pirate thing I suppose. Tentacles are cool in the same way that goggles or pirate boots are cool, they just are. So when, a couple of years ago as I was browsing Etsy for Christmas presents, and I stumbled across these tentacle scarves I knew I had to have one.

As it was Christmas though, the shop was also selling tentacle holiday stockings, to hang above the fire and fill with presents on Squidmas Eve! (warning – link NSFW and a bit gruesome in a cartoony way). Seeing the two together a thought struck me; better than an ordinary tentacle scarf would be a long scarf with two tentacle stockings at either end, that I could use as tentacled gloves/arm warmers or just as pockets to keep my oyster card etc in.

So I messaged the seller to make enquiries. She was happy to make the scarf for me just as I’d described it, but it would have to wait until the new year as she was backed up with Christmas orders at the time. She also quoted me a price, $68 for a normal scarf, $84 for one with the extra pockets; that’s £42 and £51 by today’s conversion rate. That might seem like a lot or a little depending on your situation. At the time I thought it was probably quite reasonable; custom knitting is labour and time intensive and the scarves looked amazing, but I still couldn’t justify spending £50 on a scarf.

Since I knew I’d have to wait until the new year anyway I decided to think about it and maybe buy it with some Christmas money. Then the new year came, I was distracted by other shiny things, and I promptly forgot.

Eighteen months or so later I remembered the scarf, the problem I was now working as an intern and so I definitely couldn’t afford £50; however I was also a slightly better knitter. This will sound horribly cliched, but I like a creative challenge. I like to look at something, try to mentally take it apart and figure out how I could create it myself; so that is exactly what I did.

Creeplings’ scarves are crotcheted, which I suspect is a more appropriate technique to use for the suckers. I do not know how to crotchet yet, nor do I own any properly sized crotchet hooks, but I do know how to knit, so this is a knitted version instead. I’m hoping that Creeplings won’t mind me posting the pattern I came up with here. If you’re not knitter yourself though, you’d rather avoid the faff, or if you’d just prefer a scarf made to a more professional looking pattern I urge you to go and buy one from her store. She seems like a lovely person, she makes kick arse awesome scarves, and now they’re only $27 i.e. £16, which is a pittance to pay for a custom hand crocheted scarf. A pittance.

For those of you who would like to have a go yourselves though the pattern I came up will be posted below soon. I had it up earlier, but as I’ve never written a knitting pattern before a friend suggested I take it down while she test knits it for me.

Thanks and much be-tentacled love!

Tentacles are cool. I wear tentacles now. ❤