How to do a stacked increase

There are so many people interested in knitting the Petal Cowl and Fox Paws, but not all knitters like to jump into a project with new and uncommon stitches. I've put together this article, a video tutorial, and a free pattern to introduce the fundamental increase that makes these patterns work.

I'll go over the basics of how to do the increase here, then, in the next article, we'll move on to some design tips.

Stacked increases are just a lot of increases worked on top of each other. It's not too complicated, but you'll have to slip stitches back (SB) to create the stack. It may feel like you're doing the wrong thing at first, but you'll see in the video how the SB stitches look. You'll find instructions for the red swatch shown in the video below in case you want to follow along.

Swatch instructions:
CO 21 sts using the long tail cast on method.
Work a few rows in garter stitch to stabilize the swatch.
Increase row: K1*K1, [KYOK, SB2] x 3, KYOK, K5, rep from * 4 more times. (61 sts)
Bind off.

Stitch definitions

CO - Cast on

KYOK -  (Knit, Yarn Over, Knit)  Knit a stitch, leaving stitch on left needle; without dropping stitch, YO, knit into front loop of same stitch again, slipping stitch from left needle to complete increase.

SB - Slip back to left needle.

 Step 1: KYOK, if you've never done this increase before, the description above will help.

 Your finished KYOK should look like this.

 Step 2: SB2, this means that you should slip 2 of the 3 KYOK sts to the left needle so that you can work them again.

 Step 3: KYOK, you'll be knitting into one of the stitches you just slipped back.

 Step 4: SB2 again.

 Repeat steps 3-4 until you have done this sequence as many times as instructed. For example in the swatch instructions it says"[KYOK, SB2] x 3" so you'll need to do steps 3 and 4  one more time.

 Step 5: KYOK

 Step 6: Knit ton as instructed, for the swatch, K5.

Here you can see what a stacked increase looks like on the needle. It looks clumpy, but that's correct.

If you want to get some more interesting practice with stacked increases, this star is a great way to use them without diving into a big project.

You can also read the next article to learn more about adapting this technique for your own projects and patterns.


Read about this stitch's friend the stacked decrease here, it has a video too.