My Russian Orenburg Shawl

Welcome, my Russian friends! In honor of visitors to my blog from Russia, I am posting photos of my exquisite handknitted lace shawl from Russia.  It was given to me as a gift when I lived in Moscow in 1976. The person who gave it to me alluded to its uniqueness and value and said the women who knit these lace shawls do their knitting using bicycle spokes for knitting needles.

From Three Orenburg Shawls to Knit: The Gossamer Webs Design Collection by Galina Khmeleva: "For over three hundred years, knitters from the Orenburg region of Russia have been creating Gossamer-style lace shawls and scarves from a series of basic elements and patterns handed down from generation to generation."  The author also says that the shawls are knit with the "special Orenburg-down fiber," but she doesn't elaborate on what the fiber is, exactly.  According to the Wikipedia page on Orenburg shawls  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orenburg_shawl), the fiber is a two ply blend of silk and the down of indigenous Orenburg goats (finer even than Angora goat down).

I don't know if my shawl is an authentic Orenburg shawl, or an Orenburg-style shawl made by a Russian knitter outside of the Orenburg region.  If any of my blog readers know how to identify authentic Orenburg knitting, I invite you to leave a comment on my blog.  I would also be grateful for any instructions on how to safely wash my shawl.  Through the years it has become slightly yellow colored and I have been afraid to wash it, it is so delicate.

Here are a few more photographs.  I encourage you to click on each photograph so you can see the fine detail of the knitting up close.