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Box and diagonal stitches · Easy

Checkerboard stitch

Scotch squares alternating with squares of tent stitch, like a checkerboard of smooth and pebbled tiles.

Checkerboard stitch: the finished stitch on canvas, 28 stitches, all slanting up to the right, in two colors
The finished stitch on canvas. Every stitch runs from one hole to another; the two colors are only there to tell the stitches apart. In the steps, new stitches are red, and the numbers give the order: up at an odd number, down at the next even one.

How to work it

  1. Start with a Scotch square

    Checkerboard stitch, step 1: the first five stitches on the canvas. Numerals 1 to 10 mark the ends of the new stitches, in working order.

    Work a Scotch stitch: five diagonal stitches over one, two, three, two and one intersections, which fill a square three threads by three. Begin with the tent stitch in the top left corner and end with the one in the bottom right.

  2. Fill the next square with tent stitch

    Checkerboard stitch, step 2: 14 stitches on the canvas, the nine this step adds in red.

    Fill the square beside it, to the right in the picture, with nine tent stitches, in three rows of three. The two squares share the holes along the edge between them.

  3. Alternate and offset

    Checkerboard stitch, step 3: 28 stitches on the canvas, the 14 this step adds in red.

    Alternate the two across the row. On the next row, work a tent square under each Scotch square and a Scotch square under each tent square.

At a glance

Also called
Scotch checker, Scotch checkerboard
Used for
large areas; backgrounds; borders
Coverage
Full
Direction
Slanted up to the right
Stitch length
Over 1 to 3 intersections

In one color the contrast is only in the texture; in two it is a true checkerboard. A larger version, which one stitch reference calls chequer stitch, uses a four-thread square: seven diagonal stitches beside sixteen tent stitches.

The stitch is in English stitch dictionaries of 1921 and 1934, which one stitch reference cites for it. Named uses include backgrounds, tiled patterns and other architectural detail, and a quilt on a bed, and one stitch list suggests working a whole pillow in nothing else.

The name is slippery. One British teacher uses 'chequer' for plain Scotch squares worked in two alternating colors, and one American teacher's 'checkerboard' is a different stitch altogether, made of upright stitches and large crosses. Scotch checker and Scotch checkerboard are the names least likely to be misread.

Tips

  • Keep every stitch, long or short, slanting the same way, from lower left to upper right.

When it goes wrong

Two squares of the same kind end up side by side.
The rows are offset: on each new row a tent square goes under a Scotch square and a Scotch square under a tent square. Check each row against the one above before going on.
Part squares at a curved or slanted edge.
Square stitches leave small gaps at the edges of irregular shapes. Fill them with as much of each square as fits, keeping the angle, or with plain tent stitch.

Variations

  • Mosaic checker. The same idea one size down: mosaic boxes alternating with blocks of four tent stitches.
  • Reversed squares. One teacher works it with the long stitches of alternate Scotch squares reversed.

Questions

Which do I stitch first, the Scotch squares or the tent squares?
Neither. Work them in turn across each row, a Scotch square and then the tent square beside it, as the steps do.

Where to go next

Stitches

Guides