Hello everyone! Tara here—
I have been playing with wooden hooks a lot lately and I have been pleasantly surprised by some and disappointed by others.
There are some definite pros and cons to them, and, if you haven’t used them before, there are a few things you need to know.
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Wood hooks are wonderfully light! They’re lighter than all of the metal, plastic, and resin hooks I have used, and they can be so soft to the touch. Because they’re so light, I was able to crochet for much longer without needing to take a break.
They can be incredibly beautiful and you can get hooks made out of almost any type of wood now. Light wood, dark wood, cherry wood, teak wood… there are so many options to choose from and each wooden hook looks different than the next.
They’re eco-friendly, which is always incredible!
And some of the hooks are just really great quality hooks.
But some of the hooks aren’t, and it’s more noticeable than it would be in a plastic or metal hook.
One of the wood hooks I used recently wasn’t the best quality and it had some burrs along it. These burrs snagged every strand of yarn, not just while I was picking my loops up, but when I was moving the loops along the hook (it was a Tunisian hook). By the time I finished one return pass, which took way longer to do than it should have, my yarn was splitting in several places.
I ended up taking some sandpaper to it, hoping it would help, and it did to an extent. You can only sand the hook down so much before you start changing the size, and this one needed to be sandpapered more than I was willing to do.
Rubbing the hook down with some wax paper also helped quite a bit and helped give the hook a bit more slip.
Speaking of: Did you know that you should rub your wooden hooks down with wax paper regularly to keep it gliding through your projects with ease? It also helps down on any squeaking that may happen if you’re working on a project with tight stitches.
Wooden hooks, even the best quality of wooden hooks, have a tendency to grip yarn as you’re working with it. For this reason, they’re incredible on projects with looser stitches and projects that use silky or metallic yarn.
Wooden hooks paired with tight stitches or textured yarn? They aren’t the best combo, and I would definitely recommend using a metal hook for those projects.
But overall, I’m definitely a new fan of wooden hooks. Just make sure you get a good quality hook and regularly smooth it down with some wax paper to keep it working like a dream!
Let us know how what your favorite hook is in the comment section!
– Tara Orchard, Editor of Crochet! Magazine
