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Crochet American flag: stripes, stars and a blue canton

Work 26 rows of single crochet, 44 stitches wide and 2 rows a stripe, starting and ending in red. From Row 13, work 18 stitches at one end in blue for the canton. Stitch on 50 white stars.

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Stripes with a canton worked inUS termsHook: 5 mm (US H-8), or the size that gives you gaugeSize from your washed swatchworsted yarn

Know these stitches: chain, single crochet

The finished American flag.

Materials and yarn planning

Yarns we’ve reviewed that suit it: Knit Picks Dishie Cone yarn, Lion Brand 24/7 Cotton worsted yarn, Paintbox Yarns Cotton Aran. For the hook, choose by size and handle.

Yarn estimate: the 1,144 single crochets at about 4 cm of medium yarn each come to about 46 m: about 19 m of red, 17 m of white and 10 m of blue, plus a little white for the stars.

For an exact figure in your own yarn, weigh a washed swatch in the pattern stitch: the weighed-swatch yarn calculator scales it to each flat panel or strip. Allow a little more for seams, edging and tails.

Finished size and gauge

The flag follows the proportions of the US flag set in Executive Order 10834: 1.9 times as long as it is tall, 13 stripes of equal height, and a blue canton seven stripes tall and two-fifths of the length. At 16 single crochets and 18 rows per 10 cm, the 26 rows, 2 a stripe, make it about 14.5 cm tall, and 44 stitches about 27.5 cm long, 1.9 times the height. The canton’s 18 stitches are two-fifths of 44, rounded up. For a bigger flag, work 4 rows a stripe and double the stitches: 88 across and 36 in the canton. These are calculations from the counts, not a measured sample.

The gauge calculator compares your swatch with the pattern. A stitch name you do not know is in the abbreviation chart; a UK pattern’s names are in the US/UK term reference.

The pattern

Count rows for this pattern

The lower stripes

  1. In red, chain 45. Row 1: single crochet in the second chain from the hook and in each chain across: 44 stitches.
  2. Row 2: chain 1 and turn (it does not count), single crochet in each stitch across, changing to white in the last stitch: pull the white through the last 2 loops. 44 stitches.
  3. Rows 3–12: work 2 rows in each color, white, red, white, red and white, 44 stitches a row, changing color in the last stitch of every second row. Don’t cut the color you put down: each stripe is 2 rows, so it waits at the same edge, and you carry it up the side.

The canton and the upper stripes

  1. Wind about 12 m of blue on the bobbin. The canton goes at the end where the odd rows finish; the flag hangs with that end at the left.
  2. Row 13 (red): chain 1 and turn, single crochet in the next 26 stitches in red, changing to blue in the last one, then single crochet in the last 18 stitches in blue: 44 stitches.
  3. Row 14: chain 1 and turn, single crochet in the next 18 stitches in blue, changing to red in the last one, then single crochet in the last 26 stitches in red, changing to white in the last stitch: 44 stitches.
  4. Rows 15–26: repeat these 2 rows for each stripe, white, red, white, red, white and red: 26 stitches in the stripe color and 18 in blue on every row, changing to the next stripe’s color in the last stitch of every second row. Leave the color you put down on the back of the flag each time. Fasten off all the colors.

Stars and finishing

  1. With white yarn and a yarn needle, stitch 50 small stars on the canton, as French knots or small crosses, in 9 rows: 6, 5, 6, 5, 6, 5, 6, 5, 6, starting and ending with a row of 6. Space the rows about 1½ rows of crochet apart and the stars about 3 stitches apart, each row of 5 sitting between the stars of the rows of 6.
  2. Weave each end into stitches of its own color. Pin the flag out flat to its size, mist it with water and leave it to dry.
  3. To hang it for the Fourth of July, sew a short chain loop to the top and the bottom of the edge beside the canton, or sew that edge round a thin dowel for a table flag.

Check the work

13 stripes of 2 rows: 26 rows. Every row has 44 stitches; from Row 13, 26 in the stripe color and 18 in blue, so the canton is 14 rows (7 stripes) tall and 18 stitches long. The stars are 6 + 5 + 6 + 5 + 6 + 5 + 6 + 5 + 6 = 50.

Single crochets in Rows 1–12, in Rows 13–26 and in the canton’s share44 · 44 · 18
  • If holes open where the blue meets a stripe, twist the two yarns once round each other at the change, on the back.
  • If the canton’s edge zigzags, the change comes late: finish the last stitch of each color with the new one.
  • If the flag leans out of square, pin it to its size again, mist it and let it dry.

Updated . Stitch counts checked row by row; we haven’t crocheted a sample of this one yet. How the patterns are checked. Keep your yarn label, hook and swatch on the printable project worksheet.

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