Stiff baskets and hat brims

What makes a basket stand

A basket stands up when the fabric of its sides is too firm to fold. Stitch names on this page are United States terms, with the United Kingdom name in brackets. Five things make crochet firm:

• A smaller hook. Use a hook a size or two smaller than the yarn's label suggests. The fabric turns stiff. Changing the hook size explains what the hook does to the fabric.
• Thick yarn, or several strands. Baskets are made in very thick yarn, or in two or more strands of thinner yarn held together as one. Crocheting with two strands shows how.
• Close stitches. Single crochet (UK double crochet) makes a dense fabric. Open and lacy stitches do not hold a basket up.
• Firm tension. Work the stitches tightly, but not so tightly that the hook is hard to get in.
• Yarn that does not stretch. Sources name cotton.

Baskets are also made by working the stitches over a rope. Crocheting over rope covers that way of working.

The base

A basket starts from a flat base. Bag and basket bases gives the rule for a round, an oval and a rectangular base.

A hard base can take the place of a crocheted one. It is a flat piece of wood or metal with a row of holes round its edge. The first round is worked through the holes, and the sides rise from there.

A finished basket that flops

If a basket folds in on itself, its stitches are likely too loose. Sources go down a hook size or two.

Any crochet piece can also be stiffened after it is made. It is wetted with starch, thinned glue or a fabric stiffener and dried in shape. Stiffening crochet gives the steps.

A hat brim

A wide crochet brim tends to flop. Sources hold it out in four ways.

A wire or a line in the last round. Lay the wire along the edge of the brim and work the last round of stitches over it, so that the stitches close round it. Overlap or join the two ends, and cover them with the last stitches. Sources use a thin wire rope, a plastic-coated hat wire (also called millinery wire), or fishing line. Two of them say the hat can still be folded or packed.

A stiffener. A brim can be starched. One pattern starches the whole hat and then, if the brim is still too soft, starches the brim alone a second time.

A firm fabric. The same things that make a basket firm work for a hat: single crochet worked tightly, a smaller hook, yarn held double, and a stiff cotton yarn.

An insert in a cap's bill. A piece of plastic canvas, cut to the shape of the bill, goes inside the bill of a cap or a visor and holds it stiff.

Washing

• Starch washes out. A starched piece has to be shaped and starched again after a wash.
• Glue stays. One source says that glue thinned with water is permanent and does not wash out as starch does.
• A wired brim is washed by hand and not wrung, as one pattern with a wire says, since wringing can warp its shape.

How to wash crochet covers the rest.

Where to go next

• Bag and basket bases for the base of a basket.
• Crocheting over rope for coiled bowls and baskets.
• Stiffening crochet for starch, glue and fabric stiffener.
• How a crochet hat is made for crowns and brims.