How to read pattern repeats: asterisks, brackets and "rep rows"

Repeats are how a pattern fits a whole blanket on one page. They are also where most people lose their place, because a single line can mean “do this 22 times” without saying 22 anywhere.

There are three kinds of repeat. Once you can tell them apart, almost every pattern reads the same way.

1. Repeats inside a row: the asterisk

*K2, p2; rep from * to end.

Work what comes after the asterisk, then go back to the asterisk and do it again, until you run out of stitches. On 24 stitches, you would work “k2, p2” six times.

Sometimes the repeat stops early:

*K2, p2; rep from * to last 2 sts, k2.

Repeat until only 2 stitches are left on the left needle, then knit those 2. The ending is there so the row starts and finishes with the same stitch.

Some patterns mark both ends of the repeat:

*Dc in next 3 sts, ch 1, sk 1 st*; rep from * to * 5 times.

Read this carefully. “Rep 5 times” usually means you work the section 5 more times, 6 in total. Some designers mean 5 in total. The stitch count at the end of the row tells you which: count what 5 and 6 repeats would give you and compare.

2. Repeats of a group: parentheses and brackets

(K1, yo) 3 times.

Work everything inside the parentheses, the number of times given after them: k1, yo, k1, yo, k1, yo.

In crochet, parentheses often mean “all into the same stitch” instead:

(2 dc, ch 2, 2 dc) in next ch-sp.

There is no number after the bracket here, so you work the whole group once, into one space. That group is called a shell.

Patterns can nest groups:

*[Sc in next st, (ch 3, sl st in 3rd ch from hook)] twice, sk 1 st; rep from * around.

Work from the inside out. The parentheses make a small picot. The square brackets repeat “sc plus picot” twice. The asterisk repeats the whole thing around the round.

3. Repeats of whole rows

Rep rows 3–6 four more times.

You have just worked rows 3, 4, 5 and 6. Now work them again, in order, four more times. That is 16 more rows, and you finish on a row 6.

The hard part is counting. You are on row 19 of the piece but row 3 of the repeat, and the pattern talks in repeat rows. Two counters help: one for the total rows and one for the row within the repeat. Our online row counter has a repeat setting that does exactly this, and in the Yarnstep app a line like “rep rows 3–6 four more times” becomes the sixteen rows it describes, so the counter walks through them for you.

“Work even” and “as established”

Two phrases often sit next to repeats:

• Work even (US) or work straight (UK): keep working the stitch pattern without increasing or decreasing.
• As established or in pattern: carry on with the stitch pattern you set up, lining each row up with the one before.

Both assume you know where you are in the repeat, so mark the first stitch of each repeat with a marker if the pattern is long.

A habit that saves hours

Before starting a row with a repeat, work out how many times it should go and check it against the stitch count in brackets at the end of the row. If the numbers do not add up, you have either misread the repeat or have the wrong stitch count from the row before. Better to find out in the first five stitches than the last.

Repeats often carry size brackets inside them, like “rep 4 (5, 6) times”. If that line looks like alphabet soup, how to read size brackets untangles it.