If you are ready to move beyond crocheting squares, blankets, and scarves, it’s time to learn how to crochet a circle.
A circle can be used as the base in a variety of projects including these nesting baskets, and depending on the stitch used, can even be the project itself.
Once you learn the basics of creating a crocheted circle, you will advance from the 2-dimensional world of crochet to the 3-dimensional world!
Grab some yarn and a hook and let’s stitch!
How to Begin
Depending on whether you want a hole in the middle of your circle, or not, will determine how you start the circle.
When you’re making a flower, you may want a hole.
To create this, you will start with a series of chain stitches, and then join the two ends of the chain with a slip stitch. You will now crochet around this circle to build the flower.
If you aren’t trying to create a sizeable hole and would like the middle of the circle to close, a magic circle is for you!
You can get step-by-step directions to create a magic circle by clicking this link.
Once you have created stitches inside the magic circle, you pull the short tail and tighten the circle to close it. Like magic!
Now to build the circle.
Building the Circle
In this tutorial, I will be showing you how to create a flat circle. Crocheting a sphere, as you would use in Amigurumi will be covered in another tutorial. Any stitch can be used to build your circle, this tutorial will use single crochet. Once you learn the basics, you can let your imagination take over and get fancy.
Building your circle is done in a sequence of increases that are intended to grow each round larger without making the circle curve (not enough increases) or ruffle (too many increases).
This is done by adding the same number of increases to each row.
If you did eight single crochets inside the magic circle, then you will do eight stitch increases in each row.
Simple!
Remember to place a marker in your first stitch to keep track of your starting point.
Row 1: 8 sc inside the magic ring (Tighten the ring, join with a sl st, ch 1. ) (8)
Row 2: Starting in next st, 2 sc in each st around. Join with a sl st, ch 1. (16)
Row 3: *2 sc in next st, sc in the next st. Repeat from * around. Join with sl st, ch 1. (24)
Row 4: *2 sc in next st, sc in next 2 sts. Repeat from * around. Join with sl st, ch 1. (32)
Row 5: *2 sc in next st, sc in next 3 sts. Repeat from * around. Join with sl st, ch 1 (40)
Do you see the pattern emerging? Each row has eight increases and grows by eight stitches.
This keeps the circle flat and growing larger with each row.
Finishing the Circle
To complete the circle and leave it as a flat circle, join with a slip stitch into the first stitch and fasten off the yarn. Use a yarn needle to weave in the end of the yarn.
As an example of all the options, you will have once you learn to make a circle, I used the circle in this tutorial to make a drawstring bag for my daughter’s makeup brushes.
I did not fasten off the yarn at the end of the circle. Once I made the circle as large as I wanted by doing eight increase stitches on each row, I continued on by crocheting into the back loop of each stitch around the circle to start building the walls of the makeup bag.
You can get as creative as you like and see what you come up with!
If you have any questions, drop them in the comments, or DM me on Instagram @solo_stitching.
Happy stitching!
xo — Lavena
