How to Crochet Plaid – The Plaid Stitch

Crochet Plaid

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It Makes me think of winter. I don’t know why, but maybe because that’s when you see it popping up everywhere. I know that the past couple of years, it has been very popular.

If any of y’all are like me, you’ve probably seen all the cute plaid patterns and were intimidated by them. You probably thought how on the earth can you use 3 colors, switch every couple of stitches and not have 10,000 ends to weave in…..Least that’s what I thought at first.

Seriously, it’s not near as hard as you might think. Crocheting plaid may be even simpler than you’ve thought.

Buffalo Plaid or Plaid???

What’s the difference?

Sometimes I would see people calling it plaid and other times buffalo plaid and I was like there are two different kinds??? The difference simply is buffalo plaid is red, burgundy and black and regular plaid can be any mix of colors like grey, white and black.

There is no difference to how you work it up, you crochet it the exact same way, just with different colors.

I actually worked up a plaid piece with some nontraditional plaid colors. Instead of grey, white and black, I used pink, purple and teal.

Just something different than the traditional colors. Any of y’all that have followed me very long probably know that I love color! So, any chance that I have to make something in bright colors, I’m going to do it!

Should I try it?

for any of y’all that have been on the fence about giving crochet plaid a try, go for it! Seriously, it’s a pretty fun stitch and it really doesn’t take that long to get the hang of.

I would suggest just starting with a gauge swatch (that I will be showing you below) and practicing with that before you start a specific project. That way if you need to give it a couple tries, it’d be easier that way.

I even made a video tutorial!

How to get started

For this tutorial, we will be working with 3 colors for our plaid piece. To do this you will need a dark color, a medium color and a light color. I’ll be using Black, Cranberry and Red.

Types of Yarn

I thought for y’alls convenience that I would link a few different brands of yarn that you could use for buffalo plaid to help give you some ideas.

I Love This Yarn in Black, Cranberry and Red

I live the closer to a Hobby Lobby than I do any other craft store, so this is my go-to yarn brand!

Lion Brand Basic Stitch Anti-Pilling Yarn would also be a great choice. Lion Brand always has high quality yarns!

I would suggest Black, Pomegranate and Red Heather

Let’s Crochet Plaid!

To start crocheting plaid you will need to chain a multiple of 6 plus 1. For this piece I will start by chaining 25 with the dark color (black)

Turn your work and single crochet in the second chain from your hook and in each chain across

chain 2, turn your work. Work 3 double crochet but don’t completely finish the third double crochet so you can change colors evenly. Pull through the next color which is the medium color (cranberry) through the last 2 loops of that double crochet

Work 3 double crochet using your 2nd color, being sure to carry the black yarn under your stitches so you can easily hide and grab it later. Be sure to follow the same pattern above for changing colors.

Continue working double crochet across alternating the 2 colors every 3 stitches.

Once you get to the very end of the row, you will want to finish the last double crochet in the color that you will start the next row on. For this piece, you will need the light color (red)

chain 2 and turn your work. Make sure that you hold the other 2 colors up and work your double crochet over them so you can use them when you need them.

On this row, you will work the lighter color and the medium color (red & cranberry) alternating every 3 stitches.

Continue working the next row in the same manner, following the same color pattern every other row.

For this particular piece I done 7 plaid rows and then I evenly single crocheted around the edges placing 2 single crochet in each corner.

And that is how easy it is to crochet the plaid stitch!!! If you liked this tutorial be sure to pin it to Pinterest or share it to social media!

Happy Crocheting!