Eliminate the Foundation Chain With Foundation Crochet Stitches

You can avoid the tedious task of making single, half double and double crochet stitches into a foundation chain altogether with foundation crochet stitches.

In this tutorial we’ll show you how to make the foundation single crochet, foundation half double crochet and foundation double crochet so you can avoid working in chains on the first row of some projects.

technique overview

What are They Anyway?

This technique combines the foundation chain and first row of stitches in one easy-to-crochet row. They eliminate the tedious chaining process that starts many projects. In a nutshell, they’ll save you time and reserve your patience for something else.

put it to use

When They Can Be Used (and when they can’t)

Foundation stitches create a stretchy foundation with a clean edge. They’re excellent for projects like sweaters and hats worked from the band, up. However, there is one major limitation…

They can only be used to create a solid row of the same stitch.

Patterns which require you to leave spaces in your foundation (like the moss stitch) or patterns that use a variety of stitches in the foundation row (like the textured wave stitch) won’t work. Foundation stitches build on themselves which doesn’t allow for much flexibility.

When you start a project with a solid row of stitches, identify the number of stitches in the first row, omit the foundation chain and use this technique instead.

see how it’s done

(FSC) Foundation Single Crochet


(FHDC) Foundation Half Double Crochet


(FDC) Foundation Double Crochet


additional resources

No More Foundation Chains! on B.Hooked TV