Over the past few years there’s been a big old trend in the knitting world for knitting with a strand of mohair alongside your “normal” yarn. A BIG old trend. And there are good reasons for the popularity of adding mohair to your knits; it gives the fabric a lovely, soft, fuzzy “halo”, it add warmth without bulk, and by using a different shade of mohair to your main yarn, you can have all sorts of fun with colour.
But if you can’t, or don’t want to wear mohair, can you still knit all these mohair-tastic patterns?
You bet.
There are some great alternatives to mohair out there, which I’ll be going through in a minute. But first, a little word on mohair itself.
Those of us of a certain age may have a memory of 80s mohair and the scratchy, non-joyous experience it gave. I certainly remember various relatives giving me big childhood hugs while wearing incredibly scratchy sweaters, and that did not endear the concept of mohair to me for a while.
But the way mohair is spun has changed since then. While 80s mohair was often spun with nylon, these days its spinning buddy tends to be silk, which makes for a much softer yarn.
That said, some people just can’t do the mo. If you’re one of those, read on. Because I’ve got the tips for you.
In a lot of cases where the pattern calls for a 4ply and mohair, you can just do a straight swap for a single strand of DK. This brings the cost of the sweater down, but means you won’t get the fluff, or marked effect that may have attracted you to the pattern in the first place.
It won’t work for every pattern, though; my new sweater Chuck, It’s On relies on contrasting mohairs with a 4ply main colour to produce its patterned effect.
But there are alternatives to that mohair – and which one is right depends on whether or not you want a bit of fluff in your knit.
Here’s the golden rule:
Yep, that’s right; the key thing for making any yarn substitution is that you can match the gauge of the pattern. And since we’re talking about laceweight mohair yarns here, that means that you can swap them out for any other yarn of the same weight.
Sure, depending on the yarn you choose you may have to mess around with your needle size a little bit, but you’re unlikely to find yourself wildly out of kilter with what the gauge of the pattern.
After that, it call comes down to one key question. Do you want to replicate the fluff of mohair, or are you anti-fluff? Because you can absolutely do either.
If you want the fluff of mohair without using actual mohair then fluffy alpaca might just be your best friend. These yarns have the softness and fluff of a mohair, but yarn spun from an alpaca fleece is much softer and smoother – meaning that plenty of people who can’t tolerate mohair find that fluffy alpaca works brilliantly for them.
And there are some aesthetic benefits too; alpaca has a softer, fluffier halo to it which produces a more blended effect when worked with another yarn. And the underlying fibre is a purer white that mohair, which can lean a little yellow and bring out those undertones in a colour way.
This all means have an absolute shedload of choice when it comes to fluffy alpaca yarns, as Suri alpaca is seemingly an indie dyer’s fluffy yarn of choice.
Skein and the Stitch, Adventures in Yarncraft, and The Fibre Fox all dye beautiful suri silk yarns that I’ve used and can wholeheartedly recommend. The Fibre Fox and Adventure in Yarncraft’s yarns come in at around 300m to 50g, and Skein and the Stitch gives you 420m per 50g.
But if your budget doesn’t stretch quite that far, you can get commercially produced yarns that don’t carry quite the same price tag.
CaMaRose’s Midnatssol (200m to 25g) has a mix of alpaca, tencel, and wool for a yarn without the itch. I’ve not used it myself, but it comes very highly rated by Sophie from The Knit Purl Girl, who knows her stuff when it comes to fluff.
And if bright colours are your thing, Kaos have an incredible range of shades on their 100% brushed alpaca yarn (225m to 25g). This one is high up on my list of yarns to try, because bright colours and fluffy alpaca is right up my street.
As I said up above, you can swap any laceweight yarn in for your mohair. So if you’re not fussed about the fluff, and just want the ability to play about with colour, you’ve got a whole load of options open to you.
These broadly fall into two categories; alpaca yarns, and wool yarns.
The lightness of alpaca fibre lends itself very well to producing laceweight yarns, so you’ll find that a lot of your options are still using our Andean friends – just with their fleeces spun in a way that doesn’t produce that fluffy halo.
You’ve still got all the benefits of the softness and warmth of the fibre, just without the fluff.
One of my personal favourites is Alpakka Folgetrad from Sandnes Garn (400m to 50g), which is designed to be an alternative to their Tynn Silk Mohair. It’s frankly ridiculously soft, and feels so fancy that knitting with it is just an utterly glorious experience.
The only downside to this one is that the colour range isn’t huge at the moment, which does limit your options a bit. But if you can find one that works for you project, then oh my, you’ll enjoy it so much.
Isager have a whole load of yarns that work beautifully when held together with another strand, but the one that we’re interested in here as a mohair substitute is their Alpaca 1.
This 100% alpaca yarn has a slightly broader colour range than Alpakka Folgetrad, and still gives you that 400m to 50g. I’ve seen this one in action at one of my Sweater School classes and it’s more than a little bit special.
At the top of my list for both colour range and affordability, meanwhile, we’ve got Filcolana Alva. It comes in 30 colours, with 175m to each 25g ball.
As I write this, I’m about to cast on another Chuck, It’s On sample holding two shades of Alva with a plain white main colour and I am EXCITED.
If alpaca ain’t your bag, and you’d rather stick with trusty old wool, then you’ve got plenty of options there as well. They may seem a bit on the spenny side at first, but the magic of laceweight yarn is that you get a hell of a lot of meterage for your money.
Holding one of these yarns alongside your main yarn will let you have loads of fun playing with colour; you can either match up your shades, or use your laceweight to create a beautiful marl.
Personally, I’m a big fan of picking a neutral main colour and letting different shades of laceweight change the look of the fabric, but the joy of knitting is that you can muck about and pick what works for you.
Dyebath Kitten Lace is an 80% merino, 20% silk laceweight that absolutely lives up to its name in terms of stroke ability. I used this yarn for my Moira Rose shawl (along with some mohair, which explains the fluff on it), and it’s an absolute beauty to work with.
Laura at Wool in Bath hand dyes it herself, and at the time of writing the shades are a bit low on stock, but it’s worth waiting for. You get an enormous 800m to 100g.
Also in the 80% wool, 20% silk club is West Yorkshire Spinners Exquisite Lace. This one has some absolutely beautiful solid colours, and yet again you’re looking at a big old 800m to 100g.
And finally, for a slightly heftier laceweight that is absolutely bringing it when it comes to colour, we have John Arbon Appledore Lace. I absolutely adore the Appledore range for the incredible weathered shades that the team have created, and I challenge you to find me a yarn more beautiful than Quench.
Add that, or its friend Slack Ma Girdle, to a neutral base yarn and you’ve got yourself a spectacular knit. And at 275m per 50g, you’re still getting a lot of metres for your money.
So there you go. Just a few of the many mohair alternatives out there. Have I missed any of your favourites? Let me know in the comments.
I said above that I was planning to use two shades of Filcolana Alva with a neutral base colour for another sample of my Chuck, It’s On pattern.
And that sample’s well underway.
It’s stupidly soft, and the colours are absolutely brilliant. So it’s safe to say I’m giving it a very strong recommend.
