Lauren Niu won the 2025 Mario Markus Prize for Ludic Science for her studies of how simple knit and purl stitches can produce intricate geometric patterns. You are holding a very special scarf. What is it? LN We call it the Magic Scarf. It is made entirely of the same yarn, which is not very stretchy. However, it creates different patterns with various levels of stretch and material properties. And all these patterns are made up of knitted squares resulting from only two basic stitches: the knit stitch and the purl stitch. You always have to choose between one or the other. The rows all have the same number of stitches. The knitting pattern i...