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Filet crochet is a needlework handicraft using hooks, usually worked from a graph or a symbol diagram. The basic method achieves two distinct values: a solid mesh, where three or four double crochet stitches form a square, and an open mesh of one double crochet, two or three empty spaces and a final double crochet — the last stitch of one mesh being also the first stitch of the next. Patterns combine solid and open meshes, the design usually in solid mesh against an open background.
Filet crochet is a needlework handicraft using hooks. It is usually worked from a graph or a symbol diagram. The basic method can achieve two distinct 'colors' - a solid mesh where three or four double crochet stitches form a square, and an open mesh of one double crochet, two or three empty spaces, and a final double crochet. The last stitch of a solid or open mesh is also the first stitch of the following mesh. Patterns are created by combining solid and open meshes, usually working the design in solid meshes and the background in open meshes. Filet crochet may also be worked with half-double crochet stitches, a variant of the double crochet stitch. The half-double stitch is half as tall, but exactly as wide as the double crochet stitch.
Filet crochet is most often worked in rows using cotton thread to create wall hangings and linens. Using fine thread, it is possible to work intricate patterns such as passages of text and personal names.
As with all other types of crochet, filet can be used with any weight of thread, cord, ribbon, yarn, or anything else flexible enough to work with a crochet hook.
Many simple cross-stitch patterns can be effectively converted to filet crochet and vice versa by filling the design region with solid block and keeping the open mesh to the area of no pattern. Filet crochet looks best if blocked before use to highlight the design. More than one color can be combined in this crochet to make the design "stand" out from the background. Using top crochet (where the crochet is worked as a top stitch over the finished piece) in contrasting or complementary thread designs can also be made more stark.
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A Grid Drawn in ThreadFilet is the most graphic of the crochet techniques because its unit is not a stitch but a square. The shared-stitch construction — each mesh borrowing its first post from the previous mesh — keeps the grid economical and regular, and the design exists in the chart before a hook is lifted, which makes filet the crochet form closest to counted embroidery in spirit: an error of one mesh shows as a displaced block in the picture, countable back to its source. Working in cotton thread at fine gauges, makers produce wall hangings, table linens, curtains and edgings in which the picture is carried entirely by density — no color change is required, though more than one color can be combined to make the design stand out, and top crochet worked over the finished piece in a contrasting thread sharpens it further. Half-Double Filet and Scale ChoicesThe half-double crochet variant shows how the system adapts: the half-double stitch is half as tall but exactly as wide as the double crochet stitch, so a filet grid built on it compresses vertically and must be charted accordingly — useful when a design needs a finer row gauge than the standard mesh gives. Scale in filet is otherwise chosen by thread: the same chart yields a curtain panel in fine cotton thread, a cushion in heavier thread, or a blanket-scale piece in yarn, since as with all crochet any weight of thread, cord, ribbon or yarn flexible enough to work with a hook can be used. The chart does not change; only the mesh size does. That separation of pattern from scale is filet's lasting usefulness — a 19th-century chart and a modern one are interchangeable, and a design drawn for a handkerchief edge can be re-scaled for a bedspread without being redrawn. Common QuestionsHow does a filet crochet pattern make a picture?Exactly the way a pixel image does: the graph is a grid, each square is one mesh, and filled squares are worked solid while empty squares are left open. Read at a distance, the contrast between dense solid mesh and airy open mesh resolves into the design — flowers, figures, lettering and whole passages of text in fine thread. Can cross-stitch patterns be used for filet crochet?Yes — many simple cross-stitch patterns convert effectively to filet crochet and vice versa, because both are grid systems: a filled cross-stitch square becomes a solid mesh and an empty square an open mesh. Designs relying on color rather than filled-versus-empty contrast convert less directly. Why must filet crochet be blocked?The mesh grid tends to pull out of square as it is worked, and the design reads correctly only when the squares are true. Blocking — pinning the finished piece out to measurements and setting it — squares the mesh and highlights the design, and is treated as part of the technique, not an optional finish. More to ExploreMore from Apparel Search: Fabric Definitions | Clothing Industry Glossary | Fashion Terms | Apparel Search Home
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