Guides / Getting started
How to read a cross-stitch chart
A chart is a plan in which each square stands for one stitch. A handful of conventions are enough to read any chart, from this site or anywhere else.
A colour or a symbol says which thread goes in each square; an empty square stays empty. The rest, heavy lines, arrows, the key, is only there to help you count right.
One square, one stitch
Each square of the chart is one stitch on the fabric. There is no scale to convert.
A chart printed in 1904: a cross in a square is one stitch on the fabric. The idea has not changed. Photo: The Tacoma Times, 1904, public domain- 60 squares across give 60 stitches across, whatever size you print it.
- A white square is not stitched: the fabric shows there.
- Centimetres depend on the fabric: see fabric and size.
Colours and symbols
One symbol per thread. Two neighbouring beiges blur together in print; a cross and a circle never do.
One square, one cross; one symbol, one thread in the key. The darker line every ten squares is there to count without getting lost.- A symbol chart stays readable photocopied in black and white.
- In the converter, a symbol on every thread, or only on look-alikes such as White and 3865.
- A square split diagonally, a line drawn on top: see half stitches and backstitch.
The key
It matches each symbol to a thread: the brand, the number, sometimes the number of strands.
- The number counts, not the name: “DMC 310” is the same black in every shop.
- A colour's stitches ÷ 1,500, rounded up: the skeins to buy.
- Chart in Anchor, threads in DMC? Each thread in the colour chart gives its match.
1,500 stitches to a skein, at 2 strands on 14-count aida
A heavy line every ten squares
That line is not stitched. It lets you count in tens rather than square by square.
- ✓ “Three tens and four”: read at a glance.
- ✗ Thirty-four squares counted one by one: rarely right first time.
Tip. Run a line of bright tacking thread every ten rows, both ways. Pull it out at the end, and you will never be a ten out again.
The centre: start there
Two small arrows, midway along the edges of the chart, mark its centre.
Fold in two, then in four: the centre is where the creases cross. On the chart, the small arrows on the edges point to it.- Fold the fabric in half, then in four, and pinch the folds.
- The centre is where the folds cross: mark it with a pin.
- Make your first stitch there, in the square the arrows point to.
- ✓ Starting in the centre: the same margin all round.
- ✗ Starting in a corner: one square out shifts everything, sometimes off the edge.
Counting without getting lost
- Before a new colour, count twice. As stitchers say: count three times, stitch once.
- Print the chart large and tick off in pencil what is done.
- What comes next, colours and rows in order: how to cross stitch.
- ✓ Count from a stitch you have already made.
- ✗ Count from the edge of the fabric.
Tip. To practise, stitch a border from the motifs in the gallery: a miscount shows at once.