Macrame Butterfly Pattern

You will need 10 cords 1,5 meters (5 feet) long. I used very thin threads - #10-12 (about 1 mm).

Creating Butterfly’s “head”

Double 2 threads and attach to cushion (pic. 1). Make a Chain braid of 25 knots on each 2 threads – it will be the butterfly’s “antennas”. Then place all 4 threads together and make 7 Square Knots. Then make a “Berry” pattern on the braid.
Separate all threads again into 2 parts, and make 9 Loop Knots on both sides of the “head”. Make sure that on right side you are making knots with right hand, holding the base cord with your left hand, and on the left side – making knots with left hand and holding base with your right hand. Make 2 circles with the braids you’ve created - these will be the Butterfly’s “eyes”. Fix them to the cushion with pins, then make a small diamond of Diagonal Hitches (pic. 2) – and put the “head” aside for now.

Pic.1

Pic.2

Creating Butterfly’s “wings”

We will create our Butterfly’s wings “upside down”, starting with it’s back small wings. Double two threads and attach them to the cushion close to each other. Make 3 Frivolite Knots with any pair of those threads, and then mount on them 3 new doubled cords with the Lark’s head knots, with two Loop knots added on both sides. After it, make a Diagonal Hitch in the next row.

Now take the second thread from top and with the first thread make 3 Frivolite Knots – it will be outer edge of the butterfly’s “wing”. Then make a Hitch on the rest of the threads (those that you just mounted with the Lark’s Head Knots).

Repeat the 2nd step twice, and then make the Hitch.

Take the edge thread and using the other 4 threads as a base make 5 Frivolite Knots. It will create half-circle, connecting forewings and hindwings of our butterfly. Attach it to cushion with pin. (pic. 3)

From the half-circle make a Hitch with three threads from the previous Hitch, then continue making the Double Half Hitches using base threads. When there will be only one base thread left, make on it two Frivolite Knots. It will be the outer edge of the wing. Fix the end with pin.

Continue making Hitches from half-circle, adding several Loop Knots to each Hitch in order to widen the wing. In other words, in the second Hitch, add 1 Loop Knot to each Double Half Hitch, fix the end with pin, and then make 3 Frivolite Knots (again wing’s outer edge). For the 3rd Hitch, add 2 Loop Knots and 3 Frivolite Knots, for the 4th – 4 and 4, for 5th and 5.

Pic.3

Pic.4

Finally, create a long central “axis” of the wing – it could be either a Hitch (Blue Butterfly) or Spiral braid (Yellow Butterfly), making right or left Loop knots and adding threads to the base. When the central “axis” will reach the half-circle, separate the 3 shortest threads and hide them under the wing (later we will use them to attach Butterfly to pin or stick, etc).(pic. 4)

Take one of the threads and weave it around the half-circle and using the thread as a base, create a Hitch with all the threads you have left and plus two threads from Butterfly’s head (pic. 5)

Repeat steps 1-6 to create the second wing. I would advice you to compare it with the first wing constantly, or to create both wings simultaneously.

Creating Butterfly’s “Body”

Make 4 more rows of Hitches, every time weaving the base thread around the half-circle.

Then continue making Hitches, pointing the base thread to the center of the butterfly’s body. In each row leave one edge thread out. Finally, you will have only 2 threads left. Now take the first of the edge threads, that we have left out, point it to the center, and using it as a base thread make a Diagonal Hitch with all other threads. (pic. 6)

Likewise, attach the second “wing” to the “head” and make another side of the Butterfly’s body.

With the 6 threads, that were left out in step 7 of creating the Butterfly’s Wings (3 from each wing), make the Berry pattern. You can use it to attach the Butterfly to any surface (as an option – just cut the threads out). Your Butterfly is ready now!

Pic.5

Pic.6

Use your imagination – and you will easily create different types of Macrame Butterflies. For example, use Frivolite with Picot, instead of simple Frivolite Knot for wing’s outer edges, or place several Hitches close to each other (the Blue Butterfly).

The pattern and images used for this work were taken from the book of Anna Krauze, "Macrame", 1987, Uzbekistan.

Back to Projects Page

Macrame Butterfly

Step-by-step instruction and scheme