DIY Fantastic Festival Hairbands Tutorial

Today I'm sharing a fun and easy DIY project: decorating plastic Alice bands!

 

 

ADVERTISEMENT: This tutorial is sponsored by Bostik, and is part of a series of crafty projects I'm creating to promote their range of adhesives. Click here to see all the posts in the series!

This post is actually the start of a whole week of Bostik-themed craftiness here on my blog. I'll be sharing creative ideas using all these different products:

I'll be using the PVA Glue, Glu Dots, Micro Dots and Blu Tack later in the week (on Wednesday and Friday), but today I'm getting crafty with Bostik's Power Repair glue.

According to the packaging, Bostik Power Repair Ultimate Strength Glue "provides a long lasting bond for just about anything - glass, wood, stone, metal, leather, rubber, plastics, ceramics and much more!" It "resists knocks and drops, is waterproof and works in extreme temperatures."

It's ideal for small repairs around the house, basically, but did I want to use it to repair something around the house? No I did not. I wanted to use it to make something fun and joyful and to test it out on a project that I'd normally use a glue gun for because I'm always interested in alternatives to worrying that I'm going to burn myself with hot glue.

So, I decided to decorate some plain plastic Alice bands and turn them into fun accessories to wear to parties, gigs, or festivals this summer.

 
To make your own headband, you'll need a plain plastic band to use as your base (the wide plastic ones are particularly great as they give you a big flat surface to glue stuff to), something fun to stick on them, and some Bostik Power Repair glue or other suitable strong glue.

I decorated the narrow hairband with bright felt balls, and the wide hairband with a trio of mini rubber ducks. Rubber ducks are pretty cute and the colours are fab, but I also love the idea of wearing rubber ducks in your hair to a festival where the forecast is for lots of rain! The Power Repair glue is waterproof, so you won't need to worry about the ducks sliding off your head during a downpour.

I applied the glue to the bottom of one of the ducks and the top of the wide headband using the narrow nozzle on the glue (you can also unscrew the whole cap if you're sticking something larger), then held them together for a few minutes.

The glue is "repositionable for up to 3 minutes" which means you don't have that OH NO I STUCK IT IN THE WRONG PLACE ARGH moment that so often happens when working with a glue gun but it does mean you may need to be patient while the glue sets a little. If you were sticking something flat on top of something else flat you could just leave them both sitting there but my duck would definitely have slid off the curved headband if I'd not held it in place.

The glue is quite a thick gel and applies easily without dripping, which is great. The packaging also boasts that it "won't glue your fingers together" which is always EXCELLENT news when working with strong glue (I always end up getting glue on my fingers no matter how carefully I work). 

I then left the headband propped up (between two small wooden boxes) for a while to give the glue a chance to set some more (it fully sets after two hours and will reach full strength after 24 hours).

After about 20 minutes I nudged the duck gently and was happy with how it was holding in place so I repeated the process to add the other two ducks, each time propping the headband up so the latest duck was sitting as horizontal as possible so it wouldn't slide down the curved band.

 

I used the same method for adding the felt balls to the narrow headband, just adding less glue and only waiting about 10 or 15 minutes for the glue to have taken hold. (I didn't time this exactly, just wandered off to get a few other things done while I was waiting so you may find you can add the next item to your headband much quicker than this!)

 

And that's it! Told you it was easy. Now all you need to do is go try on your hairband(s) and take some selfies :)

DISCLOSURE: this post is sponsored by Bostik, who also provided the Power Repair I used to make the headbands.

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