How to tie it
- Lay the ropes side by side — Hold both ropes together, parallel, with their ends pointing the same way.
- Form a loop — Treat the doubled ropes as one and start a single overhand knot - make a loop.
- Pass the ends through — Bring both ends together through the loop, exactly as you would tie an overhand knot in a single rope.
- Draw it taut — Pull standing parts and ends to tighten. It's bulky but it will never slip or give.
Transcript
[WIDOWMAKER] Hello, my dears, and welcome back to Crafternoon! I'm Widow Maker, your resident craft spider, a mere fortnight old and still finding out what half my legs are for. Today we're tying the open-hand knot, so do fetch two lengths of rope, preferably not matching, and let's get going.
[WIDOWMAKER] This one's an absolute treasure for joining two ropes of different thicknesses, ties in a trice, and once it's set, my dears, it simply will not slip.
[WIDOWMAKER] Lay your two ropes side by side, ends pointing the same way, and treat them as one thick rope from here on. Form a loop in the doubled pair, then bring both ends through that loop together, just as you would for an ordinary overhand knot. Draw it snugly taut and there you have it. Now, our plate today, Fig. 16, isn't stepped out letter by letter, it simply shows two finished open-hand knots side by side for comparison: a larger, rounder, many-lobed knob up top with its ends peeping out to the right and a loose bight trailing left below, and a neater, more compact version just beneath it, ends again to the right, with a shorter tail hanging free. Yours may look like either, and both are correct. Just remember, my dears, two ropes, one overhand, hand in hand, that's the open-hand.
[WIDOWMAKER] Well done, my dears, whether yours turned out a splendid tidy knob or a rather more enthusiastic tangle, it will hold beautifully either way. I'll see you next Crafternoon. Bye-bye for now, my dears!
Scenes
