#decreasing stitches

The start of the triangular series! For this first tutorial, it will be very basic on how to make a little triangle. It’s not the best method because the outcome is not the prettiest but it’s the easiest to pick up! If video is more your thing, check it out at the bottom of the post. 

How to crochet a triangle - changing stitch count

1st method: Decreasing stitch count

For this first method, we start off with a longer row and slowly decrease the stitch counts in each row. Step 1 starts off with chain of 5.

The crochet pattern is as follows:

Row 1: Ch5 Row 2: Sc4, turn - 4st Row 3: Skip 1st st, sc3, turn - 3st Row 4: Skip 1st st, sc2, turn - 2st Row5: Sc1

From step 3 onwards, always skip the 1st in the row, to quickly decrease the total stitch count. Then single crochet into the rest of the row.

The number of stitches in each row will go down from 5 to 4 to 3 to 2 and finally in step 6, to just 1 single crochet in the row.

The final not so pretty triangle but simple to do and quick to work up. As you can see, the pointed end may not appear to be so pointy, so this is not my favourite method to use.

2nd method: Increasing stitch count

Using this method on the other hand, starts off with a shorter row which subsequently increases in length.

The crochet pattern is:

Row 1: Ch2 Row 2: 2sc1, ch1 and turn - 2st Row 3: 2sc1, sc1, ch1 and turn - 3st Row 4: 2sc1, sc2, ch1 and turn - 4st Row 5: 2sc1, sc3 and end off - 5st

Do 2sc1 in the 1st of every row to lengthen the stitch count for the row.

Like in step 4, complete the rest of the row in 1 single crochet in each st. In this case, I continued until the final row has 5 stitches.

The final triangle looks slightly different from the one on top, also not the prettiest but easy to do. I seldom use these 2 methods already but when I was first starting out, I used it quite a bit.

If you are more of a video person, check out the same tutorial in video form right at the bottom of this blog post. Feel free to fast forward and pause at areas you are not sure of.

If you want a step-by-step laid out downloadable PDF of all the ‘Back to Basics’ tutorials, go check out my free 30-page ebook outlining the very basics of crocheting (even before tackling shapes!).

This is actually a little tiny Dumbledore and yes, his beard uses the same method of making a triangle using decreasing count method. **I actually have this little amigurumi hairstyles ebook with different techniques to make hairstyles including facial hair like the above!**