How to Knit: Wrap-and-Turn Short Rows

When it comes to putting curves into knitting, nothing beats the noble short row - and it's not as complicated as it looks, I promise. Short rows can help add a bend into an otherwise straight rectangular shawl, and let you turn corners with ease when knitting sock toes and heels.

Short rows make this piece into a trapezoid - long bottom, short top and inward-sloping sides.

Want to knit "wrap-and-turn" short rows? Of course you do. Let's learn how!

The main application of the wrap-and-turn style short row is for the toe or heel of a sock - it creates a wedge-shaped 'pocket' of knitting. For a short-row toe you will be working with half of the number of stitches you need around the ball of the foot (a provisional cast on is usually your starting point for this), and for a heel you'll be using the 'bottom' half of your foot stitches. The other stitches and needles can just hang at the back of your work - you don't need them for now.

To get started, knit across to the last stitch on the needle. Instead of knitting this one slip it purlwise across to the right-hand needle (so that it isn't twisted), bring the yarn around to the front, slip the stitch back across, and bring the yarn back between the needles again. This should 'wrap' the unworked stitch (which helps to avoid gaps and holes later).

Wrapping a short row stitch, from the knit side.

That's it, your first short row!

Now turn your work - be careful to keep the yarn between the needles, and don't let that stitch slip off - and purl back across. You can pull the wrap a little tighter on your first stitch to keep your work neat. When you get to the last purl stitch, repeat the process again in reverse - slip the unworked stitch (purlwise) to your right-hand needle, wrap your yarn around to the back, return the stitch to the left-hand needle and bring your yarn back through. 

Wrapping a short row stitch, from the purl side.

If you have a row counter, it can help to keep track of how many stitches you have wrapped - they aren't always obvious to pick out just by looking, and it's easy to lose count. Just tally up each row as you finish it (both the knit and purl side) and you won't have to worry about losing your place.

At this point you just need to continue short rowing your way down until you have about a third of your stitches left - on the second RS row you knit across until there are two stitches unworked, and you wrap the second one, on the third RS row you wrap the third stitch from the left. People with pointier feet may want to wrap more stitches, people with more rounded toes and heels may want less, but it's usually within a few stitches of a third left unworked in the middle.

Once you've reached that trapezoid wedge shape you're half way - time to work your way back up to your starting stitch count.

Knit across until you reach the last (most recent) of your wrapped stitches. If you look closely at it you should be able to see the wrap, and you want to pick that up and knit it together with the stitch. I find it easiest to slip the stitch to the right-hand needle, use the left to pick up the wrap, before returning the stitch to the right to knit them together - in the photos below I've marked that stitch for you so it's a little easier to follow.

You need to knit the marked stitch together with the wrap around it.

Once these stitches are knitted together you need to slip and wrap the next one (in our example, the ninth from the left), the same way you have been doing up until this point. This means that from now on you will have two wraps to pick up when you knit your stitches together.

A stitch with two wraps - you need to pick up both of these and knit all three together.

Repeat this process for the purl row - purl across, pick up the wrap (or, on subsequent rows, both wraps!) from the first wrapped stitch, and purl them together. Then slip and wrap the next stitch and turn your work.

A wrapped purl stitch.

TIP: this side will look neater if you purl the stitches together through the back loop instead, as it helps to keep the bulk on the inside of the toe and looks more symmetrical with the k2tog side.

Once all stitches have been picked back up, and worked together with their wraps, you should have your original stitch count on your needle and a wedge-shaped pocket of knitting. If you worked from a provisional cast on there should be the same number of stitches on the needle as waiting on the waste yarn, and if you're working on a heel you should have the same number as are waiting on the other needle(s).