Helix Knitting is a fun and simple technique for knitting single row stripes in the round with many colors! It not only creates jogless knitting, but you don’t even have to worry about carrying up the various yarns as you go. Watch our Helix Knitting Tutorial below for a step-by-step explanation of this technique!

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Hey, this is Laura from Purl Soho and I am going to demonstrate Helix Knitting. Helix Knitting is a fantastic technique for working single row stripes in the round when you have more than two colors. Rather than the traditional way of working single row stripes where you would work you know, a single round in one color and then a single round in the next color. Here, you’ll be working all of your colors, in this case four, in each and every round. Yeah, let’s get into the demo. 

Before we start the demo, I just want to point out a couple of things. One is that I have 36 stitches casted onto this circular needle. And I have four different colors. The reason I mention this is that in the setup round, you’re gonna work each color the same number of stitches.

So for me, that’s gonna be 36 divided by 4, so I’ll be working 9 stitches in each color. And you can use that for, whatever your cast on is. Alright, let’s jump into the setup row. So, as you can see here, I have this swatch started, I have a few rounds of reverse stockinette, but now I’m gonna jump into the setup row, or round.

And I want to, continue using the same yarn, the same color yarn for my first nine stitches. So I’m going to just take nine knit stitches. All right, let’s double check. Two, four, six, eight. Great. Okay, so while you before you switch colors, I’m going to just suggest, I have these balls lined up here on purpose and it’s to avoid creating a tangly mess.

So now that I have completed working with color A, I’m going to move it to the end and scoot these down and then grab the tail for color B. And now once again I’m going to knit nine stitches. I’m going to just join color B here and knit nine. Alright, picking this up, scooting it down here, grabbing this tail, or end rather, and I’m going to join color C.

And once again, knit 9. All right, on to our last color, color D. And this color will take us to the end of the round. And you guessed it, I’m going to knit nine stitches.

All right, so we have completed the setup round. We knit each and every color. But before I move yarn, or sorry, color D to the end, I’m actually going to you’re always going to start your next round with the color you ended on. So I’m going to go ahead and continue with color D. First I’ll slip my end of round marker here.

And the nice thing is I don’t even have to count. my stitches this time. I’m gonna knit color D across these white stitches and as soon as I get to the next set of stitches, I know that it’s time to drop color D, pick it up, move it to the end here, and pick up color A. Now I know I want to use color A because it’s the first one in line.

It’s also the yarn coming off of the row, or round rather, the round right below. So I just pick this up, And now, you might have the urge, especially on this very first round, to tug very tightly, but really fight that urge. You want to have really even consistency so that you don’t create any puckers or anything at the transitions.

Because one of the most rewarding parts of helix knitting is that it’s a jogless technique. You don’t have to deal with that kind of stagger step that you deal with, with striping in the round in the traditional fashion. So here I have reached the end of those orange stitches. I know it’s time to drop this color yarn, move it to the end, and now I just look at the section below.

Pick that, that tail up or that end up and now I’ll use that color to work across the next section of stitches. And isn’t that nice? We don’t have to count anymore.

Finish those stitches. I’m going to plop this down there. My pile is migrating. Here we go. Center it up. Look below. Grab this working yarn from this color right below, the color you just finished. Pick it up and simply work across that next section of stitches.

Now here we are about to get to the end of this round. And as I mentioned at the beginning of this round. And you’ll always be starting the next round with the color you just worked. So before I move this to the end, I’m going to slip this stitch marker and continue working this purple color on top of this gray color you can see here, and it’s when I get to that next color that I will switch my working yarn. 

And that’s it. You go round and round and round and you’re working all four colors or however many colors you have in each and every round and there’s no jogs and it’s so fun. That’s helix knitting. I’m gonna just keep going.

Be sure to also check out our free Helix Tube Scarf pattern to give helix knitting a try!

Helix Knitting | Purl Soho

Or if you want to explore this technique on your own, use any number of yarns and make sure you cast on a multiple of that number. In order to determine your pattern, you will divide the cast-on number by the number of colors, and you will knit that number stitches for each color in each round. For example, if you have 9 yarns and you decide to cast on 63 stitches, each round you would knit each color for 7 stitches because 63 divided by 9 is 7. Let us know if you have any questions… We’d be happy to help!

Looking for more inspiration? Explore all of our free knitting patterns and knitting tutorials, buy one of our many knitting kits and yarn bundles, and shop for beautiful yarn. We have over 35 gorgeous natural fiber yarns in 100’s of magnificent colors, designed to bring integrity, beauty, and joy to your next knitting project and only available at Purl Soho!