DIY Fabric Flowers

DIY Fabric flowers have so many uses. Attach them to hair clips, brooch backs and even necklaces. These round petal DIY fabric flowers will only take you a few minutes to make and are easy for even beginners. Best of all, if you make lots of them, they may even make a dent in your scrap fabric collection.

These DIY fabric flowers use circles of fabric to give the nice rounded petals. They also curve up at the ends so have a quite 3-dimensional look which is nice. Fabric flowers are surprisingly quick and simple to make and don't need a sewing machine. Just your scrap, a needle, and thread!

More DIY Fabric Flowers

If you are looking for more shapes of flowers here are two more tutorials. These additional shapes are also made from circles of fabric and are great for reducing your scrap basket.

How to Make Fabric Yo-Yos - These flowers are made from gathered circles and are round and puffy.
Cloth Flower Making - These are a similar flower with pointed ends.

cloth flower making — Cloth Flower Making

how to make fabric yo yos — Cloth Flower Making

DIY Fabric Flowers - The Video

Please watch this 2-minute video on making these DIY fabric flowers. You will see just how easy it is! Don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel for weekly sewing and craft videos.

DIY Fabric Flowers VIDEO

DIY Fabric Flowers - Supplies

FABRIC - 6 circles of fabric. As a general rule, the flowers end up the same finished diameter as your circles. So a 3 inch (7.5cm) diameter circle will result in a 3 inch (7.5cm) finished flower. You can make the flowers as small or large as you like! I have used the 3-inch (7.5cm) size. Fabrics with a tight weave work best as they have some thickness and body and won't fray too much. Try using all your quilting fabric scraps.
NEEDLE AND THREAD -Thick thread and a hand needle. I like to use upholstery thread. If you have trouble threading thick threads, use a needle threader.
OPTIONAL - Buttons or beads to decorate. These can be any size. The advantage of using a button is that it covers the center raw edges. Shank buttons with a loop underneath sit well on top of your flower.
FELT - 1-inch (2.5cm) diameter felt or fabric circle for the back. This hides all the ends and gives you a great base for gluing your DIY fabric flower to brooch backs, hair clips, and necklaces.
GLUE - Hot glue gun to attach the felt and buttons.

DIY Fabric Flowers - Instructions

Here are the instructions for the DIY fabric flowers. Scroll down to see some photos of my sample being made.

Step 1 - Press

You should have 6 circles of fabric. I always cut an extra one in case something goes wrong or if I want to add an extra petal at the end.

Press your circles in half with the WRONG sides together.

Step 2 - Stitch

Using a small running stitch (up and down stitch), sew around the curved raw edges of your semi-circle. Go through both layers of fabric. The stitches should be quite small. See if you can stitch ⅛-1/4 inch (3-6mm) stitches.

Step 3 - Pull

Pull the thread through and gather up the petal. Be gentle! Leave a 3 inch (7.5cm) tail of thread that you can use later to knot off.

Step 4 - Repeat

Repeat for the other petals of the DIY fabric flowers. If your fabric is really thick you may find that you only need 5 petals instead of the 6. For thin fabric, you may need an extra petal. Play around a bit and see what you like the look of.

Step 5 -Tie

Pull tight and tie the ends of the thread in a double knot. Knot again just to doubly make sure it won't come undone. If your flowers are going to be subject to a lot of wear and tear, you can even put a drop of glue on the knot.

Step 6 - Glue

Glue your felt circle on the back of the flower to hide the messy center.

Step 7 - Finish

Glue a bead or button to the front of the flower. Buttons with a shank work well as you can nestle it in the hole in the middle.

Here are the steps photographed for you.

DIY Fabric Flowers - In Conclusion

Enjoy your DIY fabric flowers. You can now glue your flower or sew your flower to necklaces, clothing, hair accessories, brooches and anything else you can think of.

Thanks for reading 🙂