Snug: a free mosaic knitting stitch pattern

I’m occasionally going back to look at the needlework charts I’ve been posting to see what interesting stitch patterns can be made from them. My hope is to inspire you to see how to do this yourself.

This month’s stitch pattern is a mosaic knitting chart made from Snug. I ran out of time to knit a swatch, but the nice thing about mosaic knitting is that the charts are similar to the final appearance of the knitting.

The thing about mosaic knitting is that it just looks difficult. It’s really easy to do! Basically, you’re knitting two row stripes, and slipping stitches from the row below to make the contrasting pattern. If you can knit stripes, you can knit mosaic patterns.

Here’s an article from Twist Collective about how it works.

When I looked at the chart below for Snug I saw that it could be made into a mosaic chart.

• Each marked square is above an unmarked square (a key thing about mosaic knitting is that a slipped stitch from one pair of rows cannot be slipped in the next pair of rows).
• There aren’t more than three consecutive marked stitches in any row.

Here is the code grid in question. It’s suitable for any craft: needlepoint, cross stitch, knitting (try working the black squares in purl stitch – this would actually be a very good chart for this!), crochet (this could be a filet crochet chart), and so on.

For my mosaic knitting chart, I started by making it into a slip stitch chart. Next I colored each square to match the color that the yarn would produce with the slipped stitches. That’s why the resulting knitting doesn’t look like the original code grid.

This is a Barbara-Walker-style mosaic chart for snug. Each row of squares in it represents two rows of knitting (which is why there’s a row number at each end). The square in the column to the right of the row numbers indicates the color of yarn being worked in that line. So in rows 1 & 2, all black squares are knit or purled, and all white squares are slipped with the yarn being held on the wrong side of the work. In rows 3 & 4, all white squares are knit or purled and all black squares are slipped.

Notes:

• This is a stitch pattern such as might be found in a stitch dictionary. This is not a pattern for a finished object.
• snug is a multiple of 16+1 stitches and 8+2 rows.
• The non-slipped stitches in the second row of each stripe may be either knit or purled, as desired.
• Before starting any of these instructions, knit two plain rows in Color A, represented by the black squares on the charts.
• Designers, please feel free to use this in your patterns. I’d like credit but won’t be offended if people don’t give it.
• If you like my posts like this, please consider supporting me on Patreon or donating with my Paypal tip jar in the sidebar. Thanks!

Abbreviations:

• k: knit.
• sl: slip. For this stitch pattern, slip all stitches purlwise.
• wyif: with yarn in front. This means you should hold the yarn on the side of the knitting that’s facing you while slipping stitches.

setup rows: knit two rows in color A (shown in black squares on the chart)

Switch to color B.
Row 1 (RS): k3, (sl, k1) x 5, sl, k3. [17 sts]
Row 2 (WS): k3, (sl wyif, k1) x 5, sl wyif, k3.

Switch to color A.
Row 3: k2, (sl, k3) x 3, sl, k2.
Row 4: k2, (sl wyif, k3) x 3, sl wyif, k2.

Switch to color B.
Row 5: sl, k2, sl, k1, sl, k5, sl, k1, sl, k2, sl.
Row 6: sl wyif, k2, sl wyif, k1, sl wyif, k5, sl wyif, k1, sl wyif, k2, sl wyif.

Switch to color A.
Row 7: k2, (sl, k3) x 3, sl, k2.
Row 8: k2, (sl wyif, k3) x 3, sl wyif, k2.

Repeat rows 1-8 as desired, then knit rows 9 & 10.

Switch to color B.
Row 9: k3, (sl, k1) x 5, sl, k3.
Row 10: k3, (sl wyif, k1) x 5, sl wyif, k3.