Fifty Shades of 4 Ply: Dotti Cushion - FREE Pattern and Tutorial!

Good evening! Let's make a cushion!!!

Dotti is a cushion made from motif that's a circle within a square. It's all joined together using a join as you go technique. It looks complicated and tricky...but it's not. I've put together some step by step photos for you to follow. There are no complicated stitches used....just basic ones. I think an adventurous beginner could quite easily manage to make Dotti. The yarn I've used is Scheepjes Metropolis. It's a fingering weight yarn that comes in a lovely array of colours so you can have fun choosing a colour palette to suit. The yarn is a super snuggly 75% extra fine merino with 25% nylon to give some added strength. It's machine washable at 40°c. On each 50g ball you get 200m of yarny goodness! This yarn is seriously scrumptious!!!! I love that it smells like wool too..... I'm a yarn sniffer! Ok let's get on with it! Ingredients You will need: Yarn A Scheepjes Metropolis 078 Lyon x 2 balls Yarn B Scheepjes Metropolis 069 Miami x 2 balls Yarn C Scheepjes Metropolis 019 Marseille x 1 ball Yarn D Scheepjes Metropolis 076 Sevilla x 1 ball Yarn E Scheepjes Metropolis 018 Suwon x 1 ball 18" Cushion Pad 3mm Crochet Hook Scissors Needle for weaving in ends Blocking materials How to: The pattern is written in UK English terms.

Using Yarn B chain 4 and join with a slip stitch to form a ring Round 1. Chain 3 (counts as first treble crochet) and then work 11 more treble crochets into the ring. Join with a slip stitch in the 3rd chain. (12 treble crochets) Round 2. Chain 3 (counts as first treble) and work a treble crochet into the first stitch. Work 2 treble crochets into the next stitch and repeat a further 10 times. Join with a slip stitch in the 3rd chain and fasten off. (24 treble crochets) Now make a heap of 2 round circles!!! You will need 162 in total. Don't faint! They're very quick to make and great for doing whilst watching telly 😊 In my version of Dotti I made 134 in Yarn B, 9 in Yarn C, 10 in yarn D and 9 in yarn E. I added them randomly when joining. If you prefer, you could lay them all out and take a snap to refer back to.

Join in Yarn A in any stitch of the circle.

Round 3. Chain 1 and work a double crochet into the same stitch. Double crochet in the next stitch. Half treble crochet and treble crochet in the next stitch. Chain 2 (to form the corner) and treble crochet and half treble crochet into the next stitch, double crochet into the next 2 stitches and chain 1. Repeat 3 more times around the circle and join with a slip in the first stitch. Fasten off and weave in ends.

YOU WILL ONLY WORK A FULL 3RD ROUND FOR THIS FIRST SQUARE.

This is where we will start to join as we go!

With Yarn A join in any stitch and work as before, making a chain and a double crochet in the first stitch. Work a double crochet in the next stitch and then a chain. Work a half treble and a treble into the next stitch then chain 2 to make the corner. Work a treble and a half treble into the next stitch and then a double into the next 2 stitches. Make a chain (this is where we are going to make the first join!) and with the 2 motifs side by side slide your hook under the side chain space of the finished square, wrap the yarn around your hook and pull through both loops on your hook to join the squares. Work 2 doubles in the next 2 stitches then a half treble and a treble in the next one. Chain 1, slip your hook into the corner chains of the finished square and join as before, work another chain. Continue around the square in pattern and join with a slip stitch. Fasten off and weave in ends.

As you can see from the photo we are leaving the bottom corners free. This is so we can join diagonally to make neat joins where all of the 4 corners meet!

Continue to join all of your squares in the first row as before. You will need to join 9 squares.

When we come to start a new row, we work as before, but now we are going starting making some diagonal joins as the picture shows. NB Ignore the line at the top....that's there in error as we've already made that join! Also, I'm left handed. You might be working in a different joining direction! It's all good 😉

This next step is where you need to start concentrating on your joining points. It's easy to miss one out! You will also see that we are joining where we have previously made a corner join. This time we are joining the corners that aren't already joined. It's made in exactly the same way only this time we sliding our hook under the previous join and catching in the corners we need to join now. It's a bit fiddly to start with but you will soon get the hang of it!

When all 4 corners are joined you get a nice neat finish!

Continue joining your squares in this manner. Each row has 9 squares and you will need to work 9 rows. I really advise weaving in your ends after you've joined each square. It doesn't take a minute and will save you the despair of having a gazillion ends to weave in before you block your pieces!!!

You need to make 2 pieces like this!

Now give them a block.

NB! This is a superwashed yarn, and as such, it will grow when wet. It actually grows a fair bit! I gave mine a nice soak in some Eucalan, gently squeezed out the excess water and then placed the squares in towels which I rolled up to get rid of as much moisture as possible. I then placed them on my blocking mats and measured 18" square and shaped them to that size. This yarn really changes texture when blocked. It becomes even more soft if that's possible!

To join your squares place the 2 cushion pieces together with wrong sides touching and using Yarn B join together by working a double crochet into each stitch. At the corners I worked 3 double crochets into the corner chain spaces.

Now I'm a bit of a lazy mare and can't be bothered (most of the time) to add buttons etc to make openings. I just joined 3 sides, popped the cushion pad in and crocheted the final side together!

It would be very easy to add in a neat opening. Just work the double crochet along one side, not joining, and on the other side join in either yarn A or B and work a few rows of double crochet so you have enough to sew your buttons on... line them up with motif joins to give you ready made button holes!

Ok I hope that was useful for you all 😁

If you get stuck just drop me an email....I try to answer them as quick as I can!

I'll leave you with some more Dotti photos.