Ed Barrall’s clever origami, but my version has no seams and is knitted (his is crocheted). This was an experiment and is quite small (more like a coaster than a hot pad!). Pictures #1 & #4 are the 2 sides of the finished coaster.

1) Used Judy Becker’s Magic Cast-on with size 7 (Magic Loop) - cast on 51 and did a round of stockinette, then a few rounds of the Chinese Wave stitch¹, finishing with stockinette until it was about 5-1/2”L x 4-3/4”H.

At that point, when the 2 corners were folded down as in picture 3, the seam line met in the middle. (Picture 2 is nearing completion of knitting in the round.) Note: I had to turn the knitting inside out after the Chinese Wave stitch, because the good looking side of that stitch was on the inside! That’s why you see reverse stockinette down the center of picture #1, even though I knitted those rounds.

2) Increased by 1 stitch to end up with an even number (52). To change the orientation for folding origami-style, I rearranged the stitches so that the last 13 of needle one, and the first 13 of needle two were on one needle (used a couple spare dpns to transfer the stitches).

I put the remaining 26 stitches on another dpn (picture 3 shows the transferred stitches). Grafted the seam together and buried the yarn end inside.

The center diagonal of picture #1 (it’s also the right edge of picture #2) is the Magic Cast-on portion. The center diagonal of picture #4 is the Kitchener - were I more perfect at grafting, the seam would not show at all!

In a large enough size, this could make a pillow as well, though you couldn’t remove the pillow - would have to wash in its entirety (unless you added buttons/zipper or the like). Varying the stitches and/or color makes for 2 differently-patterned sides.

The final size is only about 4” X 4-1/4” - not completely square, though blocking may fix that. (It did, but we don’t need any more pictures of this.)

See susanh02’s project here for a good picture of the folding process (kind of hard to understand in the original pattern).

The plain stockinette version at the bottom is an unembellished hotpad I finally made - 7 1/2” x 7 1/2,“ also seamless. And then I left it on a hot burner and ruined it. Glad it was so ordinary. (But it was nice and double-thick for placing hot items on it.)

The final photo is various double-thick hotpads/coasters, mostly doubleknit, but one origami piece (and one I use as a knitting tool holder ;>).

BTW, a really nice fabric-backed potholder: http://sites.google.com/site/knitbug/knitbug

2/17/16 stumbled on a linen stitch knit version: http://www.thechillydog.com/2016/01/knitting-pattern-gram...

and a knit version with great graphics: http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/magic-square-poth...

In the round, rows 2 and 4 need to use P instead of K