May we count your visit with Google Analytics? It uses cookies and sends visit data to Google. You can change this any time under Cookie choices. Privacy

crochetguide

Find what you need

Search this site. Press Escape to close.

Crochet tea towel: a griddle-stitch towel with a button tab

Chain 41 and work 48 rows of griddle stitch, single and double crochet in turn. Then narrow the top by 2 stitches a row to a 12-stitch strap with a buttonhole, sew on a button and hang it from a rail.

Go to the pattern ↓

Flat rows with a tapered tabUS termsHook: 5 mm (US H-8), or the size that gives you gaugeSize from your washed swatchworsted yarn

Know these stitches: chain, single crochet, double crochet, griddle stitch, single crochet decrease

The finished tea towel.

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 1,920 griddle stitches at about 5.5 cm of medium yarn each and the 566 single crochets of the tab at about 4 cm come to about 130 m. Check the length on the ball bands.

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

At about 14 stitches and 12 rows per 10 cm in griddle stitch, the 40 stitches make the towel about 28.5 cm wide and its 48 rows about 40 cm long. For a wider towel, add stitches 2 at a time. The tab narrows by 2 stitches a row to 12, and the strap, 18 rows of single crochet, wraps round a rail up to about 3 cm thick. 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

Towel

  1. Chain 41. Row 1: single crochet in the second chain from the hook, double crochet in the next chain, then [single crochet in the next chain, double crochet in the next chain] 19 times: 40 stitches.
  2. Row 2: chain 1 and turn (it does not count). [Single crochet in the next double crochet, double crochet in the next single crochet] 20 times: 40 stitches. A single crochet always sits on a double crochet and a double crochet on a single crochet: that makes the griddle’s texture.
  3. Rows 3–48: repeat Row 2: 40 stitches, about 40 cm. Do not fasten off.

Tab and strap

  1. Row 49: chain 1 and turn, single crochet 2 together, single crochet in each stitch to the last 2, single crochet 2 together: 38 stitches.
  2. Rows 50–62: repeat the last row, 2 stitches fewer each time: 12 stitches at Row 62.
  3. Rows 63–77: chain 1 and turn, single crochet in each stitch across: 12 stitches.
  4. Row 78, the buttonhole: chain 1 and turn, single crochet in the first 4 stitches, chain 4, skip the next 4, single crochet in the last 4: 12 stitches.
  5. Rows 79–80: chain 1 and turn, single crochet in each stitch and chain: 12 stitches. Fasten off and weave in the ends.

Button and hanging

  1. Sew the button to the right side of the tab, in the middle of Row 60, just below where it narrows to the strap.
  2. To hang the towel, hold the tab behind the oven door rail or a drawer handle, bring the strap over the top and down the front, and button it. The towel hangs below the rail and stays on it when you pull a hand across it.
  3. The towel is thicker than a woven one, so it holds more water and takes longer to dry: hang it open between uses and wash it as hot as the yarn’s label allows.

Check the work

Each towel row has 20 single crochets and 20 double crochets. The tab loses 2 a row for 14 rows: 40 − 28 = 12. The buttonhole row is 4 + 4 chains + 4 = 12.

Stitches in every towel row, at the start of the tab and in the strap40 · 38 · 12
  • If the texture looks like plain rows, a single crochet has landed on a single crochet: in every row, work each stitch into the opposite kind.
  • If the tab leans, a decrease has been missed at one end: work one at each end of every tab row.
  • If the strap will not reach the button, the rail is thicker than 3 cm: add rows before the buttonhole row.

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.

What to do next