Country Bunting

With summer on our doorsteps I wanted to brighten up our garden with some summer colour. Bunting is an immediate way to create a summery party-feel to your home or garden, and whilst it is relatively easy to make it is always expensive when bought in the shops.

This project is a really fun first time project if you have your granny's sewing machine in the loft and haven't used it before.. You have little room to go wrong, but a warning that it is quite a time consuming project.


Firstly I cut up my cardboard template. Lots of bunting is based around the triangle shape, but I wanted to try something different, so I used a small plate and cut off a third of it. This then formed my template.

You could use one type of fabric, or like me you could mix up your patterns and fabrics, which is a great way to use up all your left-over pieces of fabric.

Fold your fabric in half and lay the template on the fabric. I used a pen to draw around the template and then carefully cut out through both layers of fabric.

If you find the fabric slips when you cut it out then pin it together first.

Once you are content with the numbers you have cut out you are ready to start sewing!

Place pairs of material together with the pattern facing each other as shown in the photo.

Pin the two shapes together around the curve and then sew around the edge of the circle approximately 1cm from the edge.

This is the only bit you will be sewing as you need the straight edge left open to turn it all out.

To make 15 meters of bunting I made 25 circular shapes. This will obviously depend on how big your shapes are and how closely you are to place them on the ribbon later.

Now you have sewed all your circles you are ready to turn them the right way around.

My tip for making sure they are as neat as possible is to cut a 1cm edge off the cardboard template, then insert it into the fabric and press the fabric with an iron before removing the cardboard.

This will ensure that the fabric bunting is beautifully turned out. I am not one for ironing at the best of times, but in this instance it is worth it.

Now for the finishing touches…

Using tape from a haberdashery begin to place your bunting along.

The tape is going to act like a hem covering over the top of each of your circle.

Lay the bunting on the bottom half of the tape, then fold it tightly over the top of the circular shape

Before sewing measure the distance you want between your circles and pin each one to the tape. It is sensible to leave a meter of tape at each of the ends. This will leave you some tape to tie up your bunting when finished.

It is worth getting the spacing accurate because it is hard to rectify after you have begun sewing.

Now start at one end of the tape and carefully use your machine to sew from one end to the other in one long seam.

It will take time and you will have to be careful to make sure that each of the circular shapes is fully caught in the tape before you sew it, but it is extremely satisfying and if you have done your work until this point you will end up with a fantastic result.

The principles of this technique can be applied to make most shaped bunting, but I think shape is so pretty and it is certainly easier than triangular bunting!