Herringbone Double Crochet: Tutorials!

I’ve gotten a lot of queries from people making the Katniss Cowl, asking for a better explanation of the stitch. So here are some tutorials for the basic hbdc, decreasing, and a link to a video tutorial by Moogly. I didn’t have time to take any more pictures, but I wrote it out more clearly. Hopefully this will help a bit!

Video

This is a video by Tamara Kelly from Moogly. She does some things differently, like chaining 3, turning and counting it as a stitch, but the basic principle is the same. For all those visual learners, here it is. Click here to go to the video, as embedding it in my post would be rather rude. Just pay attention to how the stitch is made, not the turning. 😉

The Basic Hbdc

Hbdc stands for herringbone double crochet ~ at least, that’s what I abbreviate it as. Here’s how you do it.

Yarn over, just like you would for a normal double crochet.

Then insert your hook into the stitch, under 2 loops as normal.

Yarn over again.

Pull the loop through the stitch, and the following loop. Now you should have two loops on your hook.

Yarn over, pull through 1 loop (this is like a chain stitch), then yarn over and pull through the last two loops. You’re done!

Decreasing With The Hbdc

After  I wrote the pattern, I figured out a better way to decrease, and this is how you do it.

Yarn over, insert the hook into the first stitch.

Yarn over, pull through the stitch, and the following loop.

Yarn over, pull through 1 loop (this is like a chain stitch.)

You should have 2 loops on your hook.

(So far it’s like normal, right? Now you just repeat those steps into the next stitch, as follows.)

Yarn over, insert the hook into the second stitch.

Yarn over, pull through the stitch, and the following loop.

Yarn over, pull through 1 loop.

Now you should have 3 loops on your hook.

Yarn over and pull through all the loops.

Decrease made!

-~-

Ok, that’s officially all I can do.  😀 Of course, I would be happy to reply to your comments if you need any more help, but hopefully this is a good starting point.

Have a lovely day!