My husband and I started our own web design and marketing business earlier this year (backpackwebdesign.com), and wanted to give a good bottle of wine to our biggest client for Christmas. I felt it wasn’t quite enough to simply hand over a paper-wrapped bottle to the lovely couple we worked with, and so came up with a design for a crocheted gift bag. This project ended up making me very excited, first because I got to learn a new stitch, and second because this was the first time I had designed something from scratch!
There are many things I like about this gift bag, one of which is its versatility with regard to gift occasion. The bag itself is both intricate and neutral in appearance, and is easily personalized with the ribbon tied around the bottle’s neck. You could match the tie to the label of the wine, for example. For an extra festive effect, the basket section could be crocheted in another colour (so, too, could the upper section, for that matter), and a yarn with a metallic thread would make it that much more sophisticated.
Celtic Weave Wine Gift Bag
Materials
Worsted-weight yarn in Tan and Cream
5.0mm (H) crochet hook
Stitch marker
Darning needle (to weave in ends)
YouTube (For Celtic Weave instructional video – https://youtu.be/FGAhOcPMiKY)
Ribbon/tie of choice
Abbreviations
SC – Single Crochet
ch – chain
st(s) – stitch(es)
BLO – Back Loops Only
DC – Double Crochet
FPDC – Front Post Double Crochet
Notes
– The Celtic Weave stitch is difficult to write easily-understood instructions for, and so I have decided against doing so, recommending instead a YouTube video from Pattern Paradise to watch that clearly shows the steps.
– Beginning chain(s) do not count as the first stitch in each round. The first stitch is crocheted into the same stitch as the chain.
– Depending on the stiffness of your yarn and the looseness of your stitches, you may want to increase or decrease the number of rounds of the Celtic Weave and/or of the single crochet rounds above it. Your best bet is to test your gift bag on a wine bottle as you go, keeping in mind that the tie around the neck of the bottle might pull the basket part up or the upper fabric part down.
Instructions
Begin with Tan yarn.
Round 1: SC x 8 in magic ring, join, ch1. (8 sts)
Round 2: 2SC in each st around, join, ch1. (16 sts)
Round 3: SC in first st, 2SC in next, repeat [SC, 2SC] pattern all the way around, join, ch1. (24 sts)
Round 4: 2SC in first st, SC in next, SC in next, continue [2SC, SC, SC] pattern all the way around, join, ch1. (32 sts)
Round 5: SC in first st, SC in next, SC in next, 2SC in next, continue [SC, SC, SC, 2SC] pattern all the way around, join, ch2. (40 sts)
Round 6: DC in BLO of each st all the way around, join, ch3. (40 sts)
Rounds 7 – 20: Celtic Weave stitch pattern begins. Please go to https://youtu.be/FGAhOcPMiKY to learn more. At the end of Round 20, join, ch2. (40 sts)
Round 21: FPDC around every st, join, fasten off. (40 sts)
Round 22: This round will be crocheted into the top of the sts of Round 19, which you will find behind and just below the FPDC stitches of Round 20. Join Cream yarn with SC, SC into every stitch around, do not join.
Rounds 23 – 40: SC into first st of round, place marker in this st, then SC in continuous rounds, placing marker in the first st of each round. Join and fasten off. Weave in ends.
Love,
Nicole
