diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index c8163b7..1fb2cfe 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -8,3 +8,5 @@ docs
 /doc/
 /Meta/
 **/.quarto/
+
+/.luarc.json
diff --git a/DESCRIPTION b/DESCRIPTION
index 2c8ada4..36ce49b 100644
--- a/DESCRIPTION
+++ b/DESCRIPTION
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 Package: quarto
 Title: R Interface to 'Quarto' Markdown Publishing System
-Version: 1.5.1.9000
+Version: 1.5.1.9002
 Authors@R: c(
     person("JJ", "Allaire", , "jj@posit.co", role = "aut",
            comment = c(ORCID = "0000-0003-0174-9868")),
diff --git a/NEWS.md b/NEWS.md
index b6afd5b..1fd8e20 100644
--- a/NEWS.md
+++ b/NEWS.md
@@ -2,6 +2,8 @@
 
 - `.libPaths()` from the calling R session will now be passed by default to all call to quarto as a subprocess. This should solve issue with **pkgdown** or when building vignettes.
 
+- Curly braces in Quarto CLI error messages are now escaped to prevent them from being interpreted as `cli` formatting syntax (#293).
+
 # quarto 1.5.1
 
 - Make sure tests pass on CRAN checks even when Quarto is not installed by adding a gihub action to test when no quarto is available. Also fix tests that were
diff --git a/R/quarto.R b/R/quarto.R
index f1aff7d..c66f555 100644
--- a/R/quarto.R
+++ b/R/quarto.R
@@ -159,6 +159,11 @@ quarto_run <- function(
     custom_env <- c("current", custom_env)
   }
 
+  # Special case for tests to force hiding echo
+  if (is_testing() && getOption("quarto.tests.hide_echo", FALSE)) {
+    echo <- FALSE
+  }
+
   res <- withCallingHandlers(
     processx::run(
       quarto_bin,
@@ -346,7 +351,7 @@ wrap_quarto_error <- function(cnd, args, .call = rlang::caller_env()) {
     msg <- c(
       msg,
       " " = paste0(rep("-", nchar(msg)), collapse = ""),
-      quarto_error_msg
+      cli_escape(quarto_error_msg)
     )
   }
 
diff --git a/R/utils.R b/R/utils.R
index f8e29c2..a5557ce 100644
--- a/R/utils.R
+++ b/R/utils.R
@@ -162,6 +162,12 @@ warn_or_error <- function(message, ..., .envir = parent.frame()) {
   }
 }
 
+cli_escape <- function(x) {
+  x <- gsub("{", "{{", x, fixed = TRUE)
+  x <- gsub("}", "}}", x, fixed = TRUE)
+  x
+}
+
 # inline knitr:::merge_list()
 merge_list <- function(x, y) {
   x[names(y)] <- y
@@ -213,3 +219,7 @@ is_empty_dir <- function(dir) {
   files <- list.files(dir, all.files = TRUE, no.. = TRUE)
   length(files) == 0
 }
+
+is_testing <- function() {
+  identical(Sys.getenv("TESTTHAT"), "true")
+}
diff --git a/tests/testthat/resources/cli_error/error.lua b/tests/testthat/resources/cli_error/error.lua
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a0ac809
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/testthat/resources/cli_error/error.lua
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+Pandoc = function(doc)
+  internal_error()
+end
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/tests/testthat/resources/cli_error/pdf-error.qmd b/tests/testthat/resources/cli_error/pdf-error.qmd
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9d0c4dc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/testthat/resources/cli_error/pdf-error.qmd
@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+format: latex
+filters: 
+  - error.lua
+---
+
+content
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/tests/testthat/test-render.R b/tests/testthat/test-render.R
index b6e2574..d0c6ca3 100644
--- a/tests/testthat/test-render.R
+++ b/tests/testthat/test-render.R
@@ -124,3 +124,27 @@ test_that("quarto_render allows to pass output-file meta", {
   expect_true(file.exists("final_report.html"))
   expect_true(file.exists("final_report.docx"))
 })
+
+
+test_that("{ } are escaped correctly in abort message", {
+  skip_if_no_quarto()
+  proj <- test_path("resources", "cli_error")
+  withr::local_dir(proj)
+  keep_files <- list.files(".", all.files = TRUE)
+  withr::defer({
+    unlink(
+      setdiff(list.files(".", all.files = TRUE), keep_files),
+      recursive = TRUE,
+      force = TRUE
+    )
+  })
+  withr::local_options(quarto.tests.hide_echo = TRUE)
+  expect_error(
+    quarto_render(
+      "pdf-error.qmd",
+      quiet = FALSE,
+      quarto_args = c("--log", "test.log")
+    ),
+    regexp = "Error returned by quarto CLI(.*)nil value \\(global 'internal_error'\\)"
+  )
+})