Knitted Flower Recipe

I’m describing this tutorial not so much as a pattern as a recipe: I think that by following the instructions below and tweaking them to you own likes, you will be able to produce a variety of  flowers with just these instructions.

In order to make your own knitted flower, you’ll need to knit a long strip of fabric, which is wider on one of the long sides than the other. From this you can form either a single rose-type flower, or a double flower. Even within these parameters there is scope for putting them together in differing ways to make a tightly-furled or more open blooms.

Of course, you might like to make a leaf to go with your flower. As this can be a bit more complicated, I’ve given a couple of links at the end for different types of leaf too.

You will need:

Needles and yarn.

Any will do, but wool tends to work nicely. Something with a lot of drape like bamboo won’t work so well to hold the shape of the flower.

Really, as long as you use an appropriate size pair of needles to yarn, you can use any size. An easy way of making different sizes of flowers is to change to a thicker yarn with bigger needles, and of course vice versa for a smaller one.

Gauge:

Don’t worry about the gauge, as these don’t need to fit anyone, but as a general rule they need to be knitted to a firm fabric rather than an open one.

Abbreviations:

K: knit

P: purl

P2tog: purl two stitches together (to decrease)

K2tog: knit two stitches together (to decrease)

Recipe:

The basic recipe for making a flower is as follows, but you can jig it about as you like for different effects, much like a cooking recipe.

The flower is knitted flat, back and forth.

Cast on 80 to 100 stitches.

Knit three rows in garter stitch.

Next row: P2tog to the end of the row.

Next row: Knit and at the same time decrease by k2tog every 5 or 6 stitches.

Work in stocking stitch from here on, and on every second row (which will be a knit row) decrease by k2tog at appropriate intervals to pull in the work until your flower is almost tall enough for a brooch (I aim for about 5-6cm usually).

Next row: K2tog to the end of the row.

Cast off.

Tip: It is up to you how you’d like to decrease. You can do it in a uniform fashion by decreasing first every 7 stitches, then every 6 and so on, or you could decrease by k2tog every 4 in the first decrease row, then by every 2 in the next, but every 5 in the third decrease row.  Of course, your decrease rows don’t have to be every second row either. By playing with the decreasing and how often you space it, you will create differently shaped flowers.

Finishing:

Wrap the knitting around on itself to find how it sits best and for the appropriate flower look for you. Sew it into place using the tails of yarn from the knitting.

Of course, you might like to make a leaf to go with your flower. There are some great patterns available online for this. Here is a good pattern from Crafty Galore. This second one from TikkunArts is a pdf.

You can make them into brooches by adding a safety pin to the back, add them to cardigans or bags, or perhaps make a whole bouquet of them, which I’ll show you how to do in the next tutorial.

Please feel free to knit up the flower brooches to keep or as gifts/charity fundraising, but please do not knit up for commercial purposes or reproduce the tutorial without first seeking permission.

Copyright © Ingrid Murnane 2009. All rights reserved.