Learn the traditional art of macrame in this easy tutorial, using soft macrame rope to make a hanger for plants or bobbins.

you’ll need:• Macrame rope• Bowl• Metal ring• S hook • Scissors

Key top tips!• We’ve used a couple of key knots for you to

learn the basics of macrame. If you get stuck at all, watch our video tutorial to see the steps in motion.

• Keep the height of the sections even at each stage, so they start and finish at the same level.

• Work with quite a loose but structured approach - not so firm as to squash the rope into tiny knots, but not so loose that it doesn’t hold a structure.

• This craft kit is not a toy and not designed for use by children.

MACRAME PLANT HANGER

VIDEO Tutorial

Available!craftiosity.co.uk/macramehanger

Illustration shows the sections of the plant hanger (see instructions for each numbered section).

• Adjust them so the ropes hang centrally on either side of the ring (i.e., with 2m on each side).

CUT YOUR ROPE

SECTION 1: THE GATHERING KNOT

• Put the 2 x 1m pieces to one side for now.

• Take one end of each of the 8 x 4m pieces and place them through the metal ring.

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• Use the S hook to hang the metal ring from the top of a cupboard or rail that you can easily reach.

• Take one of the 1m lengths of rope and, with tail facing up, loop an end around your hand as shown in the photo.

• Pinch where the loop meets at your thumb (below the metal ring), and wrap the rope around to cover your 8 initial ropes, at the base of the metal ring.

• Make sure the ‘loopy’ bit of your loop is still at the bottom of your hand (roughly 8-10cm from the ring).

• Carefully unwind the loop around your macrame rope and put your hand / arm through the centre of the coil of rope.

• With the rope looped around one hand, this is the easiest way to unwind it to cut into lengths without it knotting.

• Cut 8 x 4 metres and 2 x 1 metre pieces of rope (10 pieces in total).

video available!

SECTION 2: THE HALF SQUARE KNOT• You’ll have 16 sections of rope hanging beneath

your gathering knot.

• Choose the four nearest the left hand side, and tuck the rest out of the way, while you work on these four ropes.

• Keep wrapping the rope around the 8 initial ropes, so each round lies evenly next to the previous round.

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video available!

• Put the end you’ve been wrapping with down through the ‘loopy’ section.

• Then pull up on the tail next to the ring, and the ‘loopy’ section will disappear up under your coil, securing the rope in place.

• Use scissors to trim both spare ends of this 1m rope piece.

• For your first half-square knot, hold your four ropes neatly next to each other, then take the one on the far left over the two middle ropes and under the one at the end.

• Create a gap between the first and second ropes when you do this.

• Stop when you have about 3cm of the ‘loopy’ section remaining.

• Once you’ve pulled the rope fully though, it will look something like this.

• Then take the fourth rope (the one on the right hand side) and bring it through the gap you’ve created, so it comes from the back of the gap through to the front.

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• The rope will naturally coil into a DNA-like double helix spiral as you create the knots.

• Once you’ve completed the 25 rounds, do the same for your next four ropes, and tuck away the spares while you work.

• Ease the knot up to the very top of the ropes, by the gathering knot.

• Your first half-square knot is done!

• Repeat the exact same knot again 25 times, easing each one up to the top of the ropes so they sit snugly next to the previous knot.

video available!

• Repeat for all 16 ropes; so you create 4 x spirals.

• For the next section, pick two spirals that are next to each other, and take the two ropes from each spiral that fall close to each other to create your next four ropes to work with (see photo).

• Create a half-square knot about 10cm down from the previous section.

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• Once you’ve pulled the rope through, adjust the height to where you want it to be.

• Before, you learned the half-square knot; we’re now going to repeat that step in reverse to complete a square knot.

• Take the rope on the right hand side over the two middle ropes and under the one on the far left hand side (creating a gap between the two ropes on the right side).

SECTION 3: THE SQUARE KNOT (5 ROUNDS)

video available!

• You’ve now created a full square knot like this.

• Do the same for the rest of your ropes (so you create 4 sections, each using 4 ropes).

• Make sure you choose two ropes from adjacent spirals each time.

• Make sure each section is the same height as the other ones, adjusting your first knots to make sure they line up.

• Then take the first rope (the one on the left hand side) and bring it through the gap you’ve created, so it comes from the back of the gap through to the front.

• Repeat this five times, so you have 5 full square knots neatly in a row.

• For the next section down, we’ll do the same as before, and take two ropes from two previous adjacent sections to give us four ropes to work with (see photo).

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video available!

SECTION 4: THE SQUARE KNOT (3 ROUNDS)

• We’ll now finish with another gathering knot.

• Bring all 16 ropes together so they hang neatly, and hold them around 15cm below the previous section.

• Place your final 1m piece of rope with the tail facing up at this point, and create a loop around your hand.

• Then repeat the previous gathering knot steps, winding the rope around from the top (leaving the upright tail out), and tucking the other end through the ‘loopy’ bit when you get to the bottom.

• Pull the tail at the top up and the loop will disappear into the gathering knot.

• Do the same for the rest of your ropes (so you create 4 sections, each using 4 ropes).

• Make sure that you choose two ropes from two previous adjacent sections each time, as shown in the photo.

• Create three square knots in a neat row.

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• As before, create a square knot, this time 10cm down from the previous section, using the same process as in section 3.

• You may want the distance between the previous section and this one to be longer, depending on the height of your plant.

video available!

SECTION 5: THE FINAL GATHERING KNOT

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• Now you know a couple of knots, experiment! Choose which knots to place where and how many repeats of each you want, as well as the length of the gaps between the sections of the hanger.

• We used a neutral macrame rope for this project, but you can source ropes in different colours, or dip dye the ends.

• Add colour to sections of the rope by wrapping embroidery thread around them and stitching in place to secure.

Make it your own wayOur key tips to experimenting with macrame hangers:

• Creating the full hanger takes around 1hr - 1hr 20mins.

HOW LONG DOES this tutorial TAKE?

COMPETITION TIME!We love to see what you make! Share your Craftiosity make with us (use #craftiosity on social) and each month we’ll pick our favourite photo - you could win a free tutorial download. Good luck!

• Pop your bowl into the base of the plant hanger.

• Well done, your hanging planter / bobbins bowl is complete!

• Trim the spare ends of the gathering knot rope.

• Now trim all the other ends of your hanging; we did ours around 17-20cm from the bottom of the gathering knot in a loose way (with the ends at slightly varying lengths).