Layered cream roses with green centres, deeply veined leaves, curling scrolls and a fine picot mesh filling every space between them, finished with a scalloped border and pointed ends.
This is Irish crochet, and it works backwards from every other runner in this collection. You do not make a background and sew things onto it. You make the motifs first, pin them face down onto a paper template, and then crochet the mesh around and between them so the ground grows to fit the design rather than the other way round.
It is the most advanced piece here. It is also the one that teaches you the most, and the two signature techniques, working over a padding cord and building petal layers behind each other, transfer to everything else you make.
What you’ll need
Size 10 crochet cotton in cream and sage green. Around 200 g of cream and 80 g of green.
A 1.75 mm hook. Irish crochet is worked fine, and going bigger loses the character entirely.
For padding, a length of thicker cotton, a doubled strand of the same thread, or proper Irish crochet padding cord. You will use several metres.
You’ll also want a large sheet of paper, tissue paper or thin cotton fabric for the template, sewing thread and a needle for tacking, rustproof pins, a blocking mat, and a tapestry needle.
Finished size is about 80 cm long and 30 cm wide.
Abbreviations are US terms. ch is chain, sl st is slip stitch, sc is single crochet, hdc is half double crochet, dc is double crochet, tr is treble crochet, MR is magic ring, sp is space, picot is ch 3 and sl st into the third ch from the hook.
Part 1. Working over a padding cord
Read this first. It is the technique that makes Irish crochet look like Irish crochet, and it appears in the leaves and the scrolls.
You hold a length of padding cord along the top of your work and crochet over it, so every stitch encloses it. The cord does not show. What it does is make the edge thick, firm and slightly raised, so a leaf stands up off the mesh instead of lying flat like a pancake.
Hold the cord in your left hand alongside the working yarn, and work each stitch around both the fabric and the cord. Keep the tension even and do not let the cord slip out at the ends. Leave a tail of cord at the start and finish, and trim it back to about 1 cm afterwards, tucking it under the stitches.
Part 2. The roses, make three
Each rose has three layers of petals, and each layer sits behind the one before.
Centre. In green, 6 sc in MR. Then into each stitch work sl st, ch 2, 2 dc, ch 2, sl st, which gives six small green petals. Fasten off.
Base ring. In cream, join to the back of the green centre. Ch 6, join into a ring. Work 12 sc into the ring, join.
Layer one. Ch 4, skip one sc, sc into the next, repeated around, giving six ch 4 loops. Into each loop work sc, 5 dc, sc.
Layer two. Now working behind layer one, ch 5 and sl st into the back of the base of the first petal, repeated around, giving six longer loops sitting behind the first petals. Into each of these work sc, 7 dc, sc.
Layer three. Again working behind, ch 6 and sl st into the back of the base of each layer two petal. Into each loop work sc, 9 dc, sc. Fasten off.
Working each set of loops behind the previous petals is the whole trick. Reach your hook round the back and anchor into the base of the petal, not into its edge. If your layers are stacking on top of each other rather than behind, that is where it is going wrong.
Sew the green centre onto the front of the rose last, over the middle.
Part 3. The leaves, make about fourteen
Worked over a padding cord, in green, in two sizes.
Large leaf. Ch 18. Holding the padding cord along the chain, work sc over the cord and into each chain across, with 3 sc into the last chain to turn the tip. Work back along the other side of the chain the same way. Join.
Round 2. Still over the cord, work sc into each stitch around, with 3 sc at the tip.
Round 3. Drop the cord. Work sc, picot, sc into every third stitch around the whole outline, which gives the leaf its toothed lace edge.
Vein. Work a line of surface slip stitch from the base to the tip, then three shorter angled veins branching off it. Then work a row of ch 3 loops either side of the centre vein, anchoring each one to the leaf, which gives the open cut through look in the photo.
Small leaf. The same over a chain of 11, with two rounds and no branching veins.
Part 4. The scrolls, make about eight
These are the curled tendrils, and they are pure Irish crochet. Nothing else in the collection has them.
Ch 30. Working over the padding cord, sc into each chain across. At the end, work back along the other side of the chain, but this time increase steadily over the last 12 stitches by working 2 sc into every second stitch.
That extra length along one side makes the strip curl on its own. Coil the increased end into a spiral, tuck it under, and stitch through the coil in two or three places to hold it.
Make some curling left and some curling right, by putting the increases on the opposite side. A row of scrolls all curling the same way looks mechanical.
Part 5. Small flowers and berries
Small flowers, make about eight in cream and four in green. 5 sc in MR, then into each stitch work sl st, ch 2, 3 dc, ch 2, sl st. Add a French knot centre in the opposite colour.
Berries, make about twelve in green. 4 sc in MR, inc four times (8), sc around, dec four times, close with a pinch of stuffing. Group them in threes.
Part 6. The template
Draw the outline of your runner on paper at actual size, 80 cm by 30 cm, with a point at each end.
Lay out every motif on it and move things around until the arrangement works. Put the three roses down the centre in a loose zigzag, the large leaves radiating from them, the scrolls filling the curves between, and the small flowers and berries in whatever is left.
Leave gaps of roughly 1 to 2 cm between motifs. That gap is where the mesh goes. Too tight and there is no room for it. Too wide and the mesh dominates and the piece stops looking like Irish crochet.
Photograph the layout. Then tack every motif face down onto the paper with sewing thread, a few loose stitches each. Face down matters, because you will be working the mesh from the back.
Part 7. The mesh ground
Join cream thread to the edge of any motif.
The mesh is simple. Ch 5, sl st into the next motif edge or into the previous mesh loop, and repeat, filling every space with a net of ch 5 loops. Where you want it finer, use ch 4. Add a picot into the centre of some loops to give the ground texture.
Work from the middle outwards, anchoring into motif edges wherever you pass one. Every motif should end up caught by the mesh at six or more points around its perimeter.
Fill right out to the drawn outline, then work the last round of mesh along the outline itself to create a firm edge.
This is slow and it is the part people abandon. Do one section at a time and do not judge it until a whole area is filled, because partially meshed Irish crochet looks like a disaster and finished Irish crochet does not.
Part 8. The border
Round 1. Sc evenly all the way around the outer mesh edge, working 3 sc into each point.
Round 2. Ch 5, skip two, dc into the next, then ch 2 and skip two, dc into the next, repeated around.
Round 3. Into each ch 2 space work 5 dc, sc into the next dc, repeated around.
Round 4. Into the centre stitch of each shell work sc, picot, sc, with 3 sl st between shells. Fasten off.
Part 9. Releasing and blocking
Cut the tacking threads and lift the runner off the paper. It will look alarming and floppy. That is normal.
Wash it gently, then pin it out on a blocking mat, stretching the mesh evenly, squaring the points and flattening every leaf and scroll. Pin the picots individually along the border. Yes, all of them.
Leave it until it is completely dry. Irish crochet is made in the blocking as much as on the hook, and this is where the piece you have been imagining finally appears.
The simpler alternative
If the mesh ground is more than you want to take on, make all the motifs, work a plain filet mesh rectangle with pointed ends as a background, and appliqué the motifs onto it.
You lose the characteristic irregular ground that flows around each shape, and it will read as lace with flowers on it rather than as Irish crochet. But it is a genuinely nice runner, it takes half the time, and it is a reasonable way to use the motifs while you build up to the real thing.
Notes and variations
All cream with no green at all is the traditional version and it is stunning.
A single rose with three leaves and a scroll, meshed into a small oval, makes a doily and is the right way to practise before committing to a runner.
Scale everything up with size 5 cotton and a 2.5 mm hook for a faster, chunkier version.
Questions I get asked
Why are my rose layers stacking on top instead of behind? You are anchoring into the petal edge rather than the base. Reach behind the petals and slip stitch into the back of where each petal starts.
Why do my leaves lie flat? You skipped the padding cord, or it is too thin. It should be noticeably thicker than your working thread.
Why won’t my scrolls curl? Not enough increases along one side. They need to be concentrated over the last third of the strip, not spread evenly.
Can I use a bigger hook? You can, but Irish crochet depends on a dense fine fabric against an open ground. At 3 mm and above the contrast disappears.
How long does it take? Around fifty hours. This is a winter project, not a weekend one.