Crochet Shapes from a Circle! Let's Make a Square!

Have you ever wondered how to crochet different shapes starting from a simple circle? Curious about how to determine where to place the corners and how many stitches to use for each side?

This Crochet Tutorial Series on how to crochet shapes from one circle will demystify this process for you. We will work through each shape creating it from the very same center circle piece, to show you how one circle can become many shapes. You can then apply these principles to craft new shapes from any of your granny squares.

Along the way we will be making small 3 rounds crochet shapes. These are perfect for using up leftover yarn and for quick, easy projects. Each tutorial will focus on a different shape, guiding you through the three rounds needed to create it.

I love making these little crochet shapes out of my left over yarns. They great take along projects. They’re also fantastic for stash-busting; requiring minimal yarn, you can whip up a bunch after each project and later combine them into larger items like pillow tops, trivets, bags, or even blankets.

Throughout this series, as we explore each shape, I will show you simple methods to calculate the number of stitches for each side. This technique allows you to easily adapt any shape you want to crochet.

Today, we’ll focus on the square, the most common of the crochet shapes. It requires a bit more attention due to the fact it has the least number of corners and thus the most amount of stitches per edge than the other shapes. Due to a longer edge on this shape compared to the others, we need to use different heights of stitches along our edges to create a straight edge from a curved one.

But before we dive into crocheting our square, let’s take a quick look at all the crochet shapes we’ll cover.

The first two rounds will create our central circle, and we will be using the same first 2 rounds for all shapes in this series. In Round 3, we’ll start shaping our square.

If you’re looking to explore more captivating color combinations for your squares, hop on over to my Instagram and Pinterest. I love sharing lots of pics of my colour experiments there!

If you would like the ad-free pattern for the 4 Crochet Shapes from 1 Circle as a PDF, with Symbol Charts, Find it in my shop, HERE, coming soon!!

Tools and Supplies:

The Yarn used in this pattern is a Worsted Weight #4

The Colours I’m using today

small amounts of 3 different colours of yarn – less than 4g TOTAL per square

Caramel – Bernat Premium

Putty – Impeccable ( Michaels )
Medium Thyme – Red Heart Super Saver

Hook: 5.00 mm US 8 / H
My Favourite Hook is the Susan Bates Ergonomic Silvalume

Other Supplies:

Scissors
Yarn needle for darning in ends

Finished Size:

Square – 3″ x 3″

More Information on Hooks Sizes, Yarn Weights and Crochet Language

Hook Sizes see the Craft Yarn Council’s Page Here

For Standard Yarn Weight Information See this Page

A Handy PDF from Annie’s on the difference between UK and US Crochet Terms

A Nice Explanation from LoveCraft’s on The UK and US differences

Abbreviations:

ch – chain

st(s)– stitch(es)

sl st – slip stitch

sc – single crochet

sc blo – single crochet back loop only

hdc – half double crochet

dc – double crochet

tr – treble crochet

lp(s) – loop(s)

yo– yarn over

rnd – round

beg – beginning

prev – previous

sp – space

sk – skip

rep – repeat

dec – decrease

Cont – continue

Crochet Shapes

Let’s take a look at all four shapes

The Square

With 24 sts after round 2, we will work with that number to determine the number of stitches in each edge.

Take the 24 sts and subtract the number of corners, to reserve these stitches for the corners, so 24 – 4 = 20 sts

now take the result of 20 and divide it by the number of edges in a square which is 4

This will give us 20 / 4 = 5 therefore we will be using 5 stitches per edge

Now taking a look at the diagram above we see we will be using 1 stitch for each corner and 5 sts for each edge

Looking at the diagram below with the actual crocheted square, we see that the corners are made up of working a ( dc, ch 3, dc ) into that one corner stitch

Then the edge stitches we use both double crochet and half double crochet stitches across the 5 edge stitches. Because we are going from a curved edge of the circle to a straight edge of the square, and it is a long edge, we need the different heights to compensate. So we end up with a dc followed by 3 hdc and then a dc, before we reach the next corner

With larger pieces you may need to work with everything from single crochet stitches in the center all the way up to treble stitches close to the corners, it depends on how much of a curve you are working with.

Crochet Square Instructions

Foundation: With Caramel, Make a Magic Ring

alternative to a Magic Ring: Ch 3, sl st in first ch, to form a ring.

Rnd 1: Continue with Caramel, ch 3 { counts as first dc }, dc 11 times into ring, sl st in 3rd ch of beg ch 3, fasten off. { 12 dc }

Rnd 2: Join Putty with a sc in any st of prev rnd, sc again in same st, ( 2 sc in next st ) 11 times, sl st in top of first sc of rnd, fasten off. { 24 sc }

Rnd 3: Join Medium Thyme with a dc in any st of prev rnd, * dc in next st, hdc in each of next 3 sts, dc in next st, ( dc, ch 3, dc ) in next st, rep from * two more times, then dc in next st, hdc in each of next 3 sts, dc in next st, dc in same st as join, ch 3, sl st in first dc, fasten off { 16 dc, 12 hdc, 4 ch-3 sp }