How to Make Covered Buttons

All About Buttons!

Embellishing is one of my favorite things to do, in fact sometimes I even add touches to ready-to-wear garments.  One of the easiest ways to restyle is to change the buttons.  Even better, your own custom covered buttons!  From simple to couture, this is what I will cover in the next series of blogs.

First, lets start with the basics on how to cover a button.  The base of the button looks just like the ones above and they come in many sizes.  There at two kinds available, I prefer the ones with what I call “teeth”, like this one from WAWAK.

Each button has 2 parts: a top that you will wrap your fabric around and a base that snaps onto the back, securing the fabric.

Let’s get started!

1. Cut out a circle from your fashion fabric,  just little bit bigger than the button.

Note:  the circle above is too large for that button, it should look more like the photo below

 2. Wrap the fabric around the curve of the button top, securing edges of fabric in the teeth.  If the fabric is plaid or striped, take care in placing the button and check the alignment of the shank to make sure its the same on every button.

3. Continue all the way around until the fabric is tight and secure.

See why I prefer the teeth, so much easier to tighten the fabric!

4. Place the backing on and snap into place with needle nose pliers.  Snap all the way around the button to make sure the back is tightly closed.

Trouble Shooting:  If you can’t snap the back of the button in place, you might have too much fabric inside.  This means the circle of fabric was too large, but you can still trim out the excess fabric to make it work.

That’s it!  Super easy and  trend with a touch of couture 🙂

I have quite a few more buttons to go, but this jacket has been cut and sitting in my “to do” bin for over a year!  Hand-dyed silk charmeuse lining and all, I must finish this before spring!

One more thing about covering buttons:  A little trick that I do to make my buttons look more professional is to add a touch of cotton.  You can use cotton balls, make-up remover cotton, batting, even a thin piece of polar fleece.

Center the cotton on the button, then wrap the fabric over the cotton.  Now when you secure the fabric tightly you won’t see any metal through the fabric and it softens the look.  Now when I want to add beading to the button I can actually get my needle through the fabric.  If you have a hard time keeping the cotton in place, use a tab of super glue, just let the glue dry before covering with fabric.

Buying Covered Buttons:

There are so many covered buttons to choose from it can get a little overwhelming, so I have included links to the ones that I use from WAWAK Sewing:

• 18L – 7/16″
• 24L – 5/8″
• 30L – 3/4″
• 36L – 7/8″
• 45L – 1  1/8:
• 60L = 1  1/2″
• 75L – 1  7/8″

These are all 12 packs, but trust me you will go through them.  These buttons have a curved top, they also carry a flat top.

Next time I will show how I made these custom buttons:

Hope you had a great week!  Off to work on samples for It’s Sew Easy TV taping next week.

Cheers,