We had a few families over this Sunday for a Cinco de Mayo Fiesta. I wanted to do something fun and colorful on the porches, and since buntings are all the rage, I wanted to see if I could whip up something fairly quickly.
My three goals were:
1. Colorful
2. Inexpensive
3. Quick to make
One thing I have more than enough of is fabric … lots and lots and lots and lots of fabric, so the “colorful” and “inexpensive” requirements were covered. The only other thing I needed was string or twine and Dollar Tree was just the right spot for that. I picked up three packages of twine. The only other thing you’ll need is something to put it all together with.
Gather your Materials
Not much is needed … fairly good-sized fabric scraps, twine, a cutting mat, a ruler, and a rotary cutter. To assemble you’ll need either a sewing machine or a glue gun with lots of glue sticks.
Choose Fabric
There was no rhyme or reason to my fabric choices other than that I wanted my flag height to be anywhere from five to eight inches. The width of your fabric will determine how many flags you will get. For this example, my fabric was about 44″ x 14″.
Prepare Fabric
I pressed my fabric and folded it both on the long side and the wide side. My fabric above is about 22″ x 7″. If you’re needing to make a lot of flags, then this is the most efficient way … it will yield four flags per cut.
Step 1 … Trim Selvage
Whenever you’re working with fabric, you always want to cut off the selvage. The selvage is the outside edge of the fabric that shows the manufacturer information, designer information, collection name, and the color information. It’s the bound edge that keeps the fabric from fraying.
Step 2 … Line up ruler for first cut
Line up the ruler so that the top is on the right-top corner and the bottom is 2-1/2 to 3 inches from the the bottom-right corner. Whichever measurement you decide on, you’ll use that throughout that particular piece of fabric. In this example I used 2.5″ from the right edge of the fabric.
Step 3 … Make first cut
Make your cut and discard that piece of fabric (or save if you can use it for another project.)
Step 4 … Second Cut
Line up the ruler again so that this time the bottom is on the point and the top is TWICE AS FAR as the bottom distance on the first cut. So … if on the first cut you were 2-1/2 inches from the bottom right, then on this cut you’ll be 5 inches from the top right. Make your cut.
Step 5 … Cut off fold
If you are working with a piece of fabric that was originally folded length-wise, then you will need to cut off the fold. Just place your ruler right below the folded edge and trim off.
Step 6 … Voila!
Voila! You’ll have either one, two, or four flags, depending on if you are working with a single, double, or double folded layer of fabric.
Step 7 … Third cut
Repeat the process in step 4 only this time the top of the ruler lines up with the top and the bottom of the ruler is the full measurement (in my example 5″.)
Step 8 … Fourth cut
Continue going back and forth until you’ve made it through the whole strip.
Voila! A bunch of pretty flags!
I picked about 15 different fabrics, which yielded a very colorful and fun pile of flags.
Before you start to assemble you need to separate all your flags and mix them all up … toss them up like a salad, or throw them in the dryer for a quick tumble.
Step 10 … Assembling
There are two options for assembling your bunting …
Option 1 … Zig Zag on sewing machine
Option 2 … Hot glue
Option 1 … Sewing Machine
I like the zig zag method because it allows the flag to slide on the twine, and the stitching gives it more of a crafty look and feel.
Simply place your flag right side down on your machine, lay the twine over the long edge of the fabric, fold the long edge over and stitch. Grab another flag, rinse, and repeat.
Option 2 … Hot Glue
If you’re looking for a super speedy way to assemble this, hot glue is the way to go.
Squiggle some hot glue on the wrong side of the top of the flag.
Lay the twine over the glue.
Fold the fabric over and gently press.
Slide the twine over about 12 inches.
Rinse and repeat.
If you want to be really careful and allow for the twine to be adjustable using the hot glue method, make a straight line of glue on the very top edge of the back side of the flag, place your twine below the glue, fold over and gently press.
The final result … yards and yards and yards and yards of colorful bunting.
All said and done, it took about 45 minutes to pick and prepare my fabric and cut the flags.
Assembly probably took about an hour and a half total for 540 feet of twine. (As a side note, I stitched the first ball of twine and hot glued the other two.)
Hope you enjoyed this little tutorial!
For another great banner / bunting tutorial, visit my “Thankful” Banner / Bunting Tutorial post.
