Chain stitch

What it is

Chain stitch is a line of thread loops, each one anchored by the loop that follows it. Because every link sits on top of the fabric rather than through it, the line stands slightly proud and reads as a braid — much bolder than back stitch at the same thread count, and the easiest way to get a heavy outline without switching to more strands.

How to work it

1. Come up on the line where the chain starts.
2. Go back down in the SAME hole you came up through, leaving a loop of thread lying on the surface.
3. Come up one link forward along the line, with the needle passing inside that loop.
4. Pull until the loop sits snugly around the thread — snug, not tight. Pulled tight, the link closes into a plain straight stitch.
5. Repeat for each link, keeping them all the same length.
6. Finish with a small straight stitch over the end of the last loop to hold it open.

What it is good for

• Bold outlines and borders.
• Lettering that needs presence at a distance.
• Filling a shape in concentric rows — chain packs solid without the length limit satin has.
• Anything where the line itself is the decoration rather than the edge of something else.

What goes wrong

• Over-tightening. A tight link is a straight stitch, and one of them in a row of twenty is obvious.
• Going down in a hole near the start rather than in it — a small gap opens at the head of every link.
• Uneven link length, which the eye picks up faster in chain than in almost any other stitch.

By the numbers

Link length

3 mmfixed — a longer line gets more links

Stitches in this example

10counted from the drawing above, not estimated

Floss it would take

19 cmworking thread to cut, at 2 strands

Links are a fixed 3 mm. A longer line gets more links; it never gets bigger ones — which is the rule the whole engine is built on, because that is how the stitch behaves in your hand.

Watch it worked

Hand-picked from YouTube. Nothing loads from YouTube until you press play.