Placement of buttons on a band is another counting exercise. The buttonholes will usually be worked on the middle row or centre stitches of a knitted-on or a separately worked and attached band. Place the first buttonhole at least a button width away from the hem edge [pic 13].

13: A knitted on band has buttonholes worked on the centre row. Place first buttonhole at least a button width from the hem. Evenly space other buttonholes.

Make sure that the subsequent buttonholes are evenly spaced. Place the top buttonhole close to the centre of a corner if you have made a cardigan or jacket with a round neck [pic 14].

14: On a round neck with a mitred corner, place top buttonhole as near to the edge as possible. The corners of the neck will flop over if the buttonhole is too low.

If the buttonhole is too low, the ends of the corners at the neck will flop Some knitters fix this by attaching a hook and eye. Bad mistake. A hook is death to knitted stitches. If you really want to keep the neck together, use a press stud or snap.

The top button on a V neck garment should be at the point of the V [pic 15].

15: On a V neck, place the buttonhole at the start of the V shape.

If you have to juggle the numbers to place the buttonholes perfectly, adjust the length between the hem and the first buttonhole, as long as the buttonhole is not at the very edge of the hem end of the band.

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Although it would seem to be a lot of extra effort, mark the position of the buttons, counting the stitches to correspond to the placement of the buttonholes. It is hard to count the number of stitches from button to button when the previous button has been attached [pic 16].

16: Mark the position of the buttons matching the buttonholes.

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A female wearer has buttonholes on the left side of a garment, a male wearer has buttonholes on the right. Of course, if you are wearing the garment, rather than looking at it, then it is the right hand side for a female, the left hand side for a male.

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