Quick and Easy Fabric Bunting

So, I bought a Cricut maker recently. It was fun playing with cardboard creations over Christmas. In fact, I made an entire Christmas village for our mantel. But a Cricut can do so much more, and when it came time to make new bunting for the dairy, I instantly thought of using my machine for the cutout of fabric. Alas, it was not to be. Stock shortages and transport problems in Australia at the moment meant I could not buy the part I needed. With a few hours before people arrived, literally, for a party I had to think creatively. Which is how I came up with this quick and easy fabric bunting idea. You do not need sewing skills for this project. All you need is a few basic tools and an hour. No joke.

Supplies for Quick and Easy Fabric Bunting

You will need a selection of different fabrics. I used quilting fat quarters. You can buy these at places like Spotlight. A fat quarter is a small amount of fabric used by quilters. They are often sold in coordinating packs. So, if you are not confident mixing and matching colours and prints you can buy a bulk pack. You might like the look of a single colour bunting. In which case you will only need one kind of fabric.

You will also need some cardboard for a template. An old cereal-type box is fine.

Next, you need scissors, a marker to trace your template, and a can of spray adhesive. I bought my can from the $2 shop. It stinks like crazy so I use it outdoors but it works really well. YOu could also use the teacher’s favourite, craft glue or PVA.

That’s it!

How to make the Bunting

I’ve made bunting from old pages from books on a number of occasions. I also made gingerbread house bunting for Christmas. Both took a bit of time.

This is not called quick and easy fabric bunting for nothing. The first step is to prepare your template. My templates are in the image below. The top of each bunting piece measures about 20cm across. The length is 25-30cm. You can make them any length you like but this size looks great.

Iron your fabric pieces flat so they have no wrinkles. You might think you can skip this step but believe me when you are sticking the two pieces to each other trying to get out a wrinkle is a huge timesuck.

Fold the pieces of fabric in half with the wrong sides together and iron a crease for the fold.

Lay one template on your first piece of fabric. The top of the bunting template should be on the fold of the fabric. Trace around the template and then lay it out again next to your first tracing. If you butt the sides together it is less tracing and less cutting. This will save time. Repeat until you have the piece of fabric filled with shapes. I got around 3 out of each.

Keep tracing on your different fabrics until you have the amount of bunting you want. For my 5 metres of bunting, I cut about 20 shapes. Now cut out the bunting and arrange in your desired pattern.

The last step in this quick and easy fabric bunting is to assemble it. I pegged the bias tape on the line. I ‘hung’ the bunting over the bias tape to check the spacing. Then I took a few pieces off and sprayed them all over on the wrong side with spray adhesive. After leaving the pieces for a minute to become tacky, I put them back on the bias tape and pressed the glued sides together.

You do have a little leeway to pull the sides apart and straighten any wrinkles or put the edges right against each other. Your bunting will be ready to use shortly after that.

TIP: It’s inevitable that you will get spray adhesive all over your fingers. It does not like to come off! However, nail polish remover will get it off quickly.

I hope you love making bunting and are inspired to give it a go.