What’s the feature that every amigurumi covets?

Is it long shapely legs? A bikini-ready body? Of course not! It’s a nicely defined neck!

Fortunately, creating a shapely neck is easy!

How to create a shapely neck

Sometimes, amigurumi come down with ‘Thick Neck Syndrome’… it’s not their fault, and it’s up to you (their maker) to help them out a little bit.

The secret to creating a defined neck is to tug the yarn tight every few stitches when you’re attaching the head to the body.

Step 1: Begin attaching with the whipstitch

To attach the head to the body, you’ll use a whipstitch (as instructed in the pattern): using a tapestry needle to stitch through one stitch on the head and the corresponding stitch on the body:

Whipstitch the head and body together for about 3-4 stitches.

Step 2: Tug!

Now that you’ve done a few stitches… tug! That’s right, just pull on the yarn and the neck will cinch up a little bit.

Step 3: Repeat steps 1-2

Continue stitching and tugging as you work your way around the neck:

See how I’m tugging? And see how the neck is becoming defined?

Why so much tugging?

You may be asking yourself… why is it important to tug every few stitches? Can’t you just wait until the end?

It’s risky.

If you wait to do a HUGE tug at the end, one of two things can happen:

1. The yarn will break (trust me… this is really sad! It means you’ll have to start all over with attaching the head)
2. The neck will be very gathered close to the end, but not very shapely towards the start- since the tugging won’t evenly distribute

Doesn’t your amigurumi deserve the best?

Don’t you want him to have the most shapely neck possible? Then treat him well… follow this trick and he’ll be the envy of all of his friends!

Tags: amigurumi, crochet, neck, techniques, tips

In: Amigurumi Tips, Blog, Tutorials