Garter stitch may be the first stitch pattern many knitters learn, but it remains one of our favorites, the same on both sides, lofty, graphic, and easy to sew together! Our Seaming Garter Stitch Tutorial shows you how to join the selvages of two pieces of garter-stitch fabric, simply and tidily. (“Selvages,” by the way, means the side edges, as opposed to the cast-on and bind-off edges.) Just a basic whipstitch, the only trick is knowing where to insert your tapestry needle… Watch and learn!

Video Tutorial

Click To See Video Transcript

Hey guys, this is Laura from Purl Soho, and I’m going to demonstrate how to seam together garter stitch along its vertical edge. Typically, you’ll be using the tail from your work, but I’ve rigged up a contrast yarn to act as the tail, just so you guys can more clearly see what I’m doing. Before we get started, let’s take a look at garter stitch.

We have these horizontal ridges running across our fabric, and the ridges are made up of two parts. You have an upper part and a lower part. The upper parts kind of look like arches, and the lower part looks like a scoop, or a lowercase U. When you’re seaming these edges together, you’re going to be picking up the stitches along this outermost edge of your fabrics.

Picking up all of the scoops along one edge, and all of the arches along the other. So first, keeping your fabrics aligned with one another, find the bottom-most ridge on your fabric. Then find the stitch that is closest to your seaming edge. And then, once you’ve done that, just take your tapestry needle and pick up that scoop, or pull your tapestry needle through the scoop. Then, come over to your other fabric. Once again, find the bottom-most ridge. Find the stitch closest to the edge and pick up that arch.

Now we’re going to come back to the fabric on the left. Place your tapestry needle right where you last exited this fabric. And in order to ensure that you’re working into the ridge just above it, all you have to do is find where you last exited and push your needle up and you’ll pick up that scoop.

Same thing goes on the other side. Find where you last exited And to be sure you’re working into the correct ridge, put your needle right where you last exited, push it up, and pick up that arch. So you’re going to work like this, back and forth, picking up the scoops on one side and the arches on the other. You can see I’m working pretty loosely here. It’s always better, to work on the loose side than the tight side because you can tighten it up later, but it’s much harder to go back and loosen up a seam. In the end, the goal is to have your seam have the same tension as the fabric you’re working… You’re working on.

I’m going to take a couple more stitches. Then once you’ve worked about an inch or an inch and a half, it’s good to tighten up these stitches. And to do that, all you have to do is take your working yarn and gently pull. And it’s just going to bring these two fabrics together perfectly like that.

Almost seamless on the front and on the back it creates, a seam, a bump, on the wrong side of your fabric. And that is how you seam together garter stitch along the vertical edge.

Step-By-Step Instructions

NOTE: A “garter-stitch ridge” is one of the distinctive horizontal stripes you see in a garter-stitch piece of fabric. Two rows of knitting make one ridge.

Orient the two pieces of garter-stitch fabric so the selvages you’re going to seam are parallel to each other. With a length of yarn threaded onto a tapestry needle…

Insert the needle up through the outermost garter-stitch “bump” at the end of the first garter-stitch ridge, right on the edge of the knitting.

Do the same on the other piece of fabric: Insert the needle up through the outermost garter-stitch bump of the first garter-stitch ridge, right across from the stitch you just picked up.

Continue sewing back and forth, inserting the needle under the outermost bump of each garter-stitch ridge. Note that on one piece of fabric, it’s likely that this bump will look like a smile and on the other side a frown. Simple!

Give It A Go!

Test out your Seaming Garter Stitch skills with our easy Contrast Cuff Hat + Handwarmers, a free knitting pattern in our super soft Speckled Hen, an 80% baby alpaca, 20% fine merino wool, sport-weight yarn.

Seaming Garter Stitch | Purl Soho

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