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I love the linen stitch and I wanted to try it in chevron, but when I searched “chevron linen stitch” on Ravelry it only came up with chevron items made with linen yarn, rather than using linen stitch.
So I came up with my own version.
The Anatomy of the Chevron Linen Stitch
There are essentially three parts of a chevron: the top or peak, the sloped sides, and the bottom or valley. You increase at the top, work straight across along the sides, and decrease at the bottom. Because of the way linen stitch works, you’ll need an odd number of stitches to make things go smoothly.
This is an example of a chevron done as a multiple of 7 (giving us 14 st per V-shape):
As you can see, there are two linen stitches per side, two done into the peak, and one in the bottom — 2 sides + 2 top + 2 sides + 1 bottom = 7 linen stitches. (And 6 sc + 1 sc2tog + 7 ch = 14 st.)
For a chevron done in single crochet, you’d ordinarily increase by 3 into the top and decrease by three at the bottom. For the linen stitch chevron, the increase is [sc, ch 2, sc, ch 1] into the top. The bottom’s a bit different.
When I tried just decreasing by two (into the ch-spaces from the previous row), it made this weird ugly line. It’s not obvious if you use the same color in each row, but with multiple colors it looks pretty goofy.
I found that if you decrease a little differently you can eliminate the line.
Normal sc2tog: insert hook into first stitch, yarn over and pull up a loop, insert hook into next stitch, yarn over and pull up another loop, yarn over and pull through all stitches.
Modified sc2tog: insert hook into first stitch, yarn over and pull up a loop; YARN OVER AGAIN; insert hook into next stitch, yarn over and pull up another loop; yarn over and pull through all four loops.
The extra yarn-over in the middle catches what would become the line and pulls it up with the other yarn! No more wonky decrease lines.
How to Make the Chevron Linen Stitch
You’ll be working a multiple of an odd number, times two. Multiplying by two makes sure you’ve got evenly matched V-shape zigzags rather than a bunch of V-shape zigzags and one oddball zig.
You have a few options on your initial multiple. Different sizes will give you different sized chevrons. It’s up to you to decide whether you want small zigzags or great big waves.
For a visual comparison:
Pink is a multiple of 5, orange is 7, yellow is 9, green is 11.
Now that you’ve picked your multiple you can actually start crocheting!
The Chevron Linen Stitch Scarf Pattern
Note: This uses a multiple of 7 as the example, which has 2 linen st per side. If you use a different multiple, change the sides as follows:
- Multiple of 5 — 1 linen st per side
- Multiple of 9 — 3 linen st per side
- Multiple of 11 — 4 linen st per side, and so on.
Ch a multiple of (7 times two) + 3.
Starting row: Sc in 3rd ch from hook (counts as sc, ch, sc), ch 1; *2 linen st; normal sc3tog, ch 1; 2 linen st; [sc, ch 1, sc] in same ch-space, ch 1;* repeat to end of row.
All subsequent rows: Ch2 (counts as sc + ch1), sc in next ch-space from hook, ch 1; *2 linen st, modified sc2tog into next two ch-spaces; 2 linen st; [sc, ch2, sc, ch1] into next ch-sp;* repeat to end of row.
Here’s a chart for a multiple of seven:
(This is my first time making a chart, hopefully it’s clear!)
If you want one just like mine:
Use a skein of multicolored and a skein of solid-color fingering weight yarn — for example, the colorways Ursula and Natural of Malabrigo Mechita, or the colorways Agave and Natural of Manos del Uruguay Alegria. (The multicolored yarn I used, Meadowcroft Dyeworks’ Cross Creek Sock in Haberdashery, is out of stock at time of writing, hence the alternate options.)
Using a D hook, with your multicolored yarn, chain 87. Follow pattern, switching colors to make stripes every six rows until you have 31 stripes or until your scarf is about 38” (95cm) long. With your solid color, make FOUR rows; switch to your multicolored yarn, make six; switch to your solid color and make ONE row, carrying your multicolored yarn across. Switch to your multicolored and cut the solid. You will now work exclusively in the multicolored yarn. Continue to work until scarf is desired length.
What’s the inspiration for this design? It’s called “apparently my solid color skein was smaller than my multicolored one, and I realized at 38” in that I was going to run out soon, so I’m pretending it’s a stylistic choice.” Oops.
If you make something with the chevron linen stitch let me know in the comments! I’d love to hear from you about your projects.
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