HOW DO I WORK ARCHES?
Use this technique to create an endless fabric.
To make arches using the Bruges crochet technique, you’ll need to combine the skills of circle joins and straight joins to create a Bruges fabric that could potentially go on forever! To start off, make a straight Bruges tape with 16 rows, following the basic instructions as before. Then proceed as follows:
Step 1 To begin the arch join, ch3 – this is half the number of chains in our chain loops. Step 2 Just as you did with the circle join, *insert hook in the next chain loop to the left, from front to back, yrh and pull up a loop. Repeat from * another four times, gradually pulling up a loop of yarn from a total of five chain loops – you should have one loop on the hook for each of the 5 chain loops, plus 1 working loop that you started with. Try to keep all the loops fairly loose and even.
Step 3 Yrh and pull through all 6 loops on the hook.
Step 4 Now turn and ch3, which is the remaining half of the chain loop. Work the 4 treble stitches of the new row to complete Row 17, which incorporates the arch join and forms a semi-circle shape in the fabric.
Step 5 Now work straight, joining to the adjacent chain loops as you go. To do this, work Row 18 as follows: turn, ch6, tr in each of 4 tr. Work Row 19 as follows: ch3, ss to next adjacent ch-loop, turn, ch3, tr in each of 4 tr.
Step 6 Repeat Step 5 twice more (23 rows in total).
Step 7 To continue the fabric, work another arch. To do this, hook another 8 rows straight (Rows 24-31).
Step 8 Now work another arch join as before, following Steps 1-4 to complete Row 32.
Step 9 Now work straight again, following Steps 5-6 until you’ve completed Row 38 – your fabric should look like it does in this photo. Continue as set or experiment by varying the stitches within each row or lengthening the chain loop.