Pride Patch Patterns: Aro Arrows, Part One

Six digitally-created versions of cross stitch pride patches, arranged in two rows of three, against a background of a textured partially-translucent aromantic pride flag. Text between the two rows reads Aro Pride Patches in black type. Patches include a rectangular patch in aroflux zigzag stripes, an idemromantic heart, an aro flag text patch reading "aro", a square in quoiromantic stripes, an arrow design in allo-aro colours and a second arrow in nebularomantic colours.
~ K. A.

A couple of years ago, I posted a tutorial for making pride-themed arrow cross-stitch patches. Unfortunately, the template I used back then made it difficult (read: time-consuming) for me to post patterns covering flag style and stripe variants. This isn’t the case with my current template, so for Aro Week I thought I’d update my arrow patterns to cover a greater selection of aromantic flags … starting with simple horizontal stripes.

Four cross stitch patches sitting on a blue microfibre blanket. Two of them are arrows stitched on a single-colour rectangular background, edged with buttonhole stitch; two of them are arrows with the buttonhole edging shaped around the arrow itself. All arrows have a tan and light tan shaft, grey arrowhead and fletching in the colours of various horizontal-striped pride flags. From top to bottom: rectangle allo-aro arrow on light green background with green edging, shaped allo-aro arrow with white edging, loveless aromantic arrow on dark green background with yellow/green multicoloured edging, and shaped quoiromantic arrow with mint edging.

Folks who need help with materials, stitching, finishing or attaching patches should check out my tutorial master page.

Previous patterns are available at my pattern gallery.

Notes on Pattern Structure

Full coloured blocks indicate a full cross stitch. Letter outlines indicate backstitch.

Blocks divided on the diagonal by a line of backstitch, each half a different colour, indicate quarter stitches. Please see my first text tutorial and my pride text tutorial for more information on backstitching outlines and placing quarter/fractional stitches.

Space for edging your patch is not shown in the patterns below. You’ll need to allow additional blocks for this when cutting your swatch, depending on how narrow or thick you like your edges.

Dimensions and Edging Modifications

All arrow patterns fit a rectangle 63 stitches wide and 17 stitches high. Assuming a three stitch border, as for my other patches, this means you’ll want a 66 x 20 block swatch plus any excess (if used unmodified).

If you’d like to omit the background and stitch your edging directly around the arrow to make a shaped patch, you’ll need a rectangle 63 stitches wide and 16 stitches high plus excess (presuming the same border width). My pride hearts patch tutorial contains a photographic breakdown on buttonhole stitching around a curved or irregular shape!

Please see my original arrow patch tutorial for a guide to background modifications and the stitching process.

Patterns: Even Horizontal Stripes

I have two arrows available: one with a plain shaft, the other with a binding that matches the fletching. Patterns are available for pride flags with three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine and ten horizontal stripes of an even width. Other horizontally-striped flags with uneven widths may still suit this pattern if they fit (or can be made to fit) a three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine or ten horizontally-striped flag base.

Three Stripe

A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, lithromantic pride flag fletching and a yellow-green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching.
A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, lithromantic pride flag fletching, lithromantic binding where shaft meets arrowhead, and a yellow-green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching and binding.

Four Stripe

A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, idemromantic pride flag fletching and a pale green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with ligher grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching.
A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, idemromantic pride flag fletching, idemromantic binding where shaft meets arrowhead, and a pale green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching and binding.

Five Stripe

A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, aromantic pride flag fletching and a pale green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with ligher grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching.
A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, aromantic pride flag fletching, aromantic binding where shaft meets arrowhead, and a pale green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching and binding.

Six Stripe

A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, aro-spec pride flag fletching and a light maroon-grey background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching and binding.
A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, aro-spec pride flag fletching, aro-spec binding where shaft meets arrowhead, and a light maroon-grey background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching and binding.

Seven Stripe

A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, nebularomantic pride flag fletching and a purple background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and purple stitches outline the fletching.
A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, nebularomantic pride flag fletching, nebularomantic binding where shaft meets arrowhead, and a purple background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and purple stitches outline the fletching and binding.

Eight Stripe

A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, quoiro-quoix flux pride flag fletching and a pale blue-green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching.
A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, quoiro-quoix flux pride flag fletching, quoiro-quoix flux binding where shaft meets arrowhead, and a pale blue-green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching and binding.

Nine Stripe

A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, loveless aromantic pride flag fletching, and a dark pine green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching and binding.
A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, loveless aromantic pride flag fletching, loveless aromantic binding where shaft meets arrowhead, and a dark pine green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching and binding.

Ten Stripe

A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft and a dark violet background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching and binding.
A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, a-spec pride flag fletching, quoiro-a-spec binding where shaft meets arrowhead, and a dark violet background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and green stitches outline the fletching and binding.

For the flags with bigger sections of fletching like the ten, nine and six-stripe patterns, you may wish to extend the shaft by a few blocks. The increase in fletching size (to accommodate the increase in stripe count) does, unfortunately, result in a stubbier-looking arrow!

I don’t believe many of these flags exist, but I’ll mention that the seven-stripe pattern can be used for a fourteen-stripe flag, the three and five-stripe patterns for a fifteen-stripe flag, the four and eight-stripe patterns for a sixteen-stripe flag, the six and nine-stripe patterns for an eighteen-stripe flag and the ten-stripe pattern for a twenty-stripe flag. Knowing this may help in adapting these patterns to fit flags with thinner, wider or irregularly-sized stripes.

Multi-Flag Modifications

These patterns can easily encompass more than one flag! Dual-flag fletching is easy to make if both flags contain the same number of horizontal stripes (for example: a greyromantic and greysexual arrow), but you can also swap out half the fletching between patterns of the same fletching size to make two-flag patches:

A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, fletching divided between the five stripe allo-aro flag and the three stripe lithro flag, and an olive green background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and dark gold stitches outline the fletching and binding.
A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, fletching divided between the five stripe aromantic flag and the four stripe ace flag, and a dark violet background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and dark green stitches outline the fletching and binding.

The fletching can be swapped between patterns as follows:

  • Three stripe pattern base: three or five stripes
  • Four stripe pattern base: four or eight stripes
  • Five stripe pattern base: three or five stripes
  • Six stripe pattern base: three, six or nine stripes
  • Eight stripe pattern base: four or eight stripes
  • Nine stripe pattern base: three, six or nine stripes
  • Ten stripe pattern base: four, five or ten stripes

You can also add or swap the bindings to make a patch featuring two flags with differing stripe counts:

A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, aromantic pride flag fletching, asexual binding where shaft meets arrowhead, and a light lilac-grey background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and dark green and dark purple stitches outline the fletching and binding respectively.
A cross stitch pattern for an arrow design with an elongated triangle arrowhead in grey, a tan shaft, allosexual aromantic pride flag fletching, pansexual binding where shaft meets arrowhead, and a light green-grey background. Outline stitching in a dark grey frames the arrowhead, with lighter grey lines of back stitching running down the head; the tan shaft is framed in a darker tan; and dark green stitches outline the fletching and binding.

To make a three-flag patch, simply add the binding of your choice to the dual-flag fletching patterns!

Part two of this post contains arrows for flags with uneven stripes or additional elements (like triangles, spikes and columns) to help even more aromantics sew and display their pride.

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