Gather your materials, this is what you need to make a basic hair bow:
- Fabric
- Scissors
- Orange stick/Pen/something pointy
- Needle and thread
- Headband/bobby pins/brooch back/something to attach it to yourself.
This is the most basic way I know to make a bow so we’ll start out easy and in other posts I’ll show you how to make more complicated ones.
Cut a rectangle of fabric the size you want your bow to be. I generally work to the ratio that the long side of the bow should be 2.5 times the length of the short sides. You can either cut one large piece and fold it in half or two pieces the correct size.
You will also need to cut a piece for the middle bit to hold it all together. For thin fabrics like this you should make it as long as your index finger and 3 times as wide as you want the middle bit to end up… if that makes sense ^_^
Thread your needle with some matching thread. Now let’s make the large part of the bow. Fold your fabric piece in half with the nice side on the inside.
Start in one corner and sew up the side. Use a plain old running stitch and if you aren’t planning to edge your fabric make sure to keep a decent seem allowance to avoid fraying. I should mention that all of this can be done on a sewing machine but as a lot of you don’t have sewing machines I thought I would do hand stitching instructions then if you do have a sewing machine you can adapt them!
When you get to the corner, keep sewing around the other side. Keep going until you’ve sewn up everything except a 2cm hole. Tie off your thread.
Now going through the hole, turn the whole thing inside out…
You get something like this:
Now using your pointy object, poke it inside the bow and use it to wiggle the corners into nice points ^_^
Then you get this, which looks much nicer:
Now let’s close up that hole! Fold the raw edges inside the bow so they follow the rest of the stitching and form a nice pointy corner. Using your needle and thread hand stitch it closed.
Now it’s time to pleat it into a bow! Fold your bow in half…
Now on each side of that fold, fold the remaining fabric in half. It should look like a concertina and you should have 3 visible pleats.
Now use your needle and thread to place a stitch to hold it all in place.
Now let’s make the middle bit. Get your other piece of fabric and fold it in thirds. This is the first fold:
This is the second fold:
Now wrap it around the middle of your bow ^_^
Sew it around the back and cut off the extra fabric.
Easy done! Now how are you going to attach it to your head? I took a headband and slid it through the tie part of the bow. I have also used the same bow by sliding a bobby pin through the back. You could attach it to a brooch or even sew it onto a ring, the possibilities are endless!
Tomorrow I’ll show you the whole outfit I wore it with ^_^. Let me know if any of you try to make a basic hair bow like this! |
You clever clever thing!
I’m going to try and make one on the weekend, I’ll show you how it goes :)
One question, where’d you find that plain black headband? I’ve been looking everywhere for one to attach bows to!
Diana xx
Oh yes do send some photos! I’m glad you liked it and I think I already answered your question in my email <3
OMG!! Its amazing!! Thank u so much for the tutorial!! :D
No worries Carme! I’m glad you enjoyed it ^_^
This is so adorable and seems so simple to do I’m definitely going to try this out sometime <3
Oh yay! Let me know how yours turns out!
This is the technique I’ve used to make bows before too C:! It’s really simple and awesome!! I love the bow material you picked out !! <3
Thank you, it was an off cut of fabric! It’s such an easy technique, definitely good for making lots and lots of bows.
Congratulations! It must be exciting to work with an eZine.
This is a cute little tutorial. Thank you for sharing it.
Oh yes it was quite fun, though I didn’t actually do anything, she did all the work! It’s great to see it up there though :D Thank you!
I was wondering how you did this yesterday…. so thank you for it! The fabric is also divine <3!
No problem! I love the fabric too!
Ooh, how pretty. I saw the bow in the last tutorial and I loved it, along with the portion of your outfit I could see ^^ Congratulations on being featured in that ezine! I’ve always wanted to be in/start an ezine…
Anyway, that was a very helpful tutorial. Thank you very much for sharing it. And thanks for replying on my comments :D
Aww thank you! Come back for the full outfit next post haha! And no worries for replying, I love getting comments and I think if you took the time to write to me the least I can do is write back! Thank you so much for reading! <3
hi awesome tutorial. and very easy to follow :)
I’m glad you liked it ^_^
You’re so crafty! Thanks for this tutorial. By the way, I love you nails! How did you do them?
Oh the nails are just a konad stamp, very very easy to do ^_^
Thank you so much for this!
I’ve been waiting for a tutorial with lots of pictures to make a bow!
Thank yooouuu~! <3
Oh no problem! I’m so glad some one will get some use out of it ^_^
That hair bow is really adorable. Great job Violet! Thank you very much for sharing this tutorial with us. :)
No problem at all, I’m glad you enjoyed :)
I too live in melbourne, I love to read your blog :)
Do you think this would work with black vinyl “leather-look” material? I’m going to try soon :)
Thanks for commenting Arielle! I don’t see why it wouldn’t work, though it would be harder to sew through vinyl and you might end up with a stiffer bow depending on the fabric. Yay for meaning other people in Melbourne! <3
I loove your blog <3
This hair bow and the hairstyles are perfect for my lolita-yukata cosplay. Thank you, Violet! You are a very cute genius
Aw thanks so much Mimi Emily! That’s really nice of you to leave me such a sweet comment ^_^ I’m so glad you found it useful!
ooh wow!! I think I can do this on my own o.o! I’m really so excited to try this :>
Nicole recently posted..Hello October! Hello Panda!
Yay! You should try it :D
I loved this tut so much! It’s really a nice, clear tutorial which is hard to find :)
I featured it on my blog here: http://randomosify.blogspot.com/2010/10/diy-friday-how-to-make-hair-bow-d.html
Aleks recently posted..DIY Friday! How to make a Hair Bow -D
I’m so glad you enjoyed it Aleks! Thanks for featuring me :D
So easy to follow :D
Thank you so much!!
I decided to follow your tutorial and make a bow for a friend of mine as a christmas gift x3
here’s what i ended up with xD
http://i199.photobucket.com/albums/aa290/kuma123_01/12092011-004.jpg
only different thing is that i added lace to the edges x3
Thank you for the tutorial :D!
Yay I’m really glad you found it useful! Your bow turned out so sweet, you should totally submit to the readers gallery :D