Behind the profile: how to make a ribbon and button brooch

Seven years ago, in October 2009, I joined Twitter. At the time I was working as deputy editor of Allaboutyou.com, in charge of the craft section, bringing hundreds of free knitting, sewing and crochet patterns and craft tutorials to our eager readers. My boss told me to get a Twitter account, and I thought it would be a useful way to connect with our craft fans, so I called it AAYCraftEditor.

For my profile pic, I chose the ribbon and button brooch I'd designed, made and written about a couple of months earlier, because it was the first craft feature I wrote on Allaboutyou.com's craft channel.

Seven years on, I've just changed my Twitter username, because Allaboutyou.com no longer exists, and I no longer tweet only about craft.

So I thought it was time I blogged on the brooch that's still my profile pic.

I made it while I was fiddling around with my sewing box and haberdashery supplies, and the two-tone wired ribbon (which I'd previously used to make bag handles, by stitching it on top of the originals) and the buttons just came together in my hand, and I admired how they complemented each other.

How to make a ribbon and button brooch
(as originally published on Allaboutyou.com)

You will need
● length of wired ribbon, measuring around 15cm
● two buttons, one large, one small
● brooch pin
● scrap of felt or other non-fraying fabric
Time taken: around 20 minutes

How to make
Pull the wire out of one side of the ribbon. Now hold one end of the wire on the other side and ease the fabric of the ribbon along it so that it bunches up. Continue until you can bend the ribbon round to make a circle. The hole in the middle should be slightly smaller than your biggest button.
Sew the edges of the ribbon together to form a circle. Cut the felt to a circle slightly smaller than your bigger button. Stitch the felt to the ribbon to cover the hole.
Sew on the bigger button in the centre of the brooch. Sew the smaller button on top. Now sew the brooch pin to the back. (You can use a safety pin if you want; no one's going to see it!)
You could make two overlapping ribbon circles to give a fuller effect.

How about?
Make a felt anemone brooch