Tuesday Tip – Better Bind Off

Tuesday Tip copyWhen Bad bind offs happen to good people.

When you bind off do you get something that looks like a noose at the end of your knitting? Does it bug you as much as it does me?

Better Bind Off

First let’s take a look at what a regular bind off leaves you with:

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Not an enjoyable edge!

Ah, but to paraphrase Jason Robert Brown’s Last Five Years, we can do better than that!

 

Bind off until there's one stitch left

1) Bind off until there’s one stitch left

Pass that last unworked stitch back to the right needle

2) Pass that last un-worked stitch back to the right needle

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3 – With tip of left needle, pick up the left (back) loop of the row below the un-worked stitch, inserting needle back to front

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4 – Move the un-worked stitch back to the left needle

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5 – Knit the last stitch and the leg of the row below together like you were doing a k2tog

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6 – This will move the slack of that sloppy last stitch to the back of your work. Similar to hiding a wrap in short rows.

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Ta Da! After you BO the last (now newly) neatened stitch this is what your edge looks like

For other knitting tips from Patty’s Knitting Bag of tricks you can learn 2 1/2 hours worth on my DVD

Interweave Knitting Bag of Tricks

Also available as a digital download

Or you can join me live in class! Click here for my live teaching schedule

To read past Tuesday tips, just click on the Tutorial category of the blog (or here I did it for you!)

If you have a “is there a better way to do that”, or “how do you do that” question, leave me a comment, and I’ll add it to the Tuesday Tip list!

 

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8 comments

  • Ingeborg September 22, 2014   Reply →

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  • Andrea Miller December 26, 2014   Reply →

    Dear Patty, I remember this stellar tip from Make. Wear. Love. and now I have a follow on question about neatening up the final bind off stitch in flat knitting. My question is: what are the steps to follow if binding off as if to purl? I tried these steps as shown but ended up with an ungainly loose stitch, possibly even looser than if I did not try to neaten it, and I am wondering if it has to do with the mount of the stitch from the row below when I am trying to neaten while binding off in purl?

    Also, I am longing to see what you did with the tail in both the swatch pictured here with the beautiful neatened last stitch in knit bind off – did you pull it through the loop, or just pull out the loop? And how would you work with the tail once the last stitch is neatened in purl bind off?

    Do you have any upcoming video on this topic, or can it be made into a Tuesday topic, or any other form of demo?

    Thanks in advance for considering!

  • Erica June 24, 2016   Reply →

    I have solved this problem when I work the row below the bind-off row. I work the row below as my pattern says but in the second stitch of the row I will slip the stitch instead of knitting or purling. When I come back to this point in the the bind-off row I “fix” the slipped stitch from the row below to be a knit or purl stitch, whichever the pattern calls for. By fixing the stitch I take up the extra slack left over at the end of the row.

  • Stacy Mae February 28, 2017   Reply →

    Thank you Patty! Just finished a swatch for a fabulous short sleeve top that I am sooo excited to make.
    And thank you very much for your time post last class at Stitches West. You were so generous with your time and I just appreciate that so much. Means a lot to this budding knit chic!
    xo-

  • Katie McDougall June 24, 2021   Reply →

    I own Knitting Bag of Tricks and I watch it often for your tips, deepening on what oil doing. Awesome content that had made me a more confident knitter.

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