How To: Felt Swan Brooches (or Swan Collar Clips!)

Have you heard of Swan Upping?

It's a historic ceremony dating from the 12th Century, where the Queen's Swan Marker and the Royal Swan Uppers row down the Thames to conduct an annual census of the swan population. They wear traditional red uniforms, row traditional wooden boats, and (as they pass Windsor Castle) stand to attention and salute "Her Majesty The Queen, Seigneur of the Swans".

My hometown is one of the places on the Swan Upper's route each July, but I've never actually witnessed it. I'm hoping to change that this year, and have got the date marked in my diary with a firmly worded Note To Self to make sure I'm not busy with work (like I sadly was last year). I'm rather looking forward to it!

Why am I talking about Swan Upping, you wonder? Well, it's because today I'm sharing a tutorial for making a little swan (or two) out of felt :)

This tutorial originally appeared in a bookazine called Adorable Animals, last year. It was designed as a tutorial for making cute swan collar clips but if you don’t fancy the idea of collar clips (or, like me, just don’t own many clothes with collars) you can just make a single swan and wear it as a brooch.

I chose light blue as a background to my swans as the white and orange both show up clearly against it and it looks like the swan is gliding on some water... but if you're making these to wear with a favourite outfit you could use backing felt that matches your garment instead.

You will need:

The template provided at the bottom of this post
White felt
Light blue felt
1 or 2 black seed beads (size 9/0) (one bead per swan)
White, black and light blue sewing thread
Orange and black embroidery thread
One or two brooch clasps (one per swan)
A needle and sewing scissors

Plus (if you're making the collar clips) small pliers and a length of jewellery chain (at least 11cm)

I recommend using embroidery scissors to cut out the felt shapes - the small, sharp blades are perfect for cutting out small or intricate pieces of felt.


To make the swans:

1. Use the template provided to cut out two swans from white felt, reversing the template to cut the second swan. Sew each swan onto a piece of light blue felt, using white thread and small whip stitches.

2. Cut a length of orange embroidery thread and separate two strands from the rest. Use these two strands to stitch the swan’s beak, starting with a line sewn at an angle to mark the end of the beak (as pictured) then filling in the beak with a series of single stitches. Sew over the white felt until it’s covered, starting and finishing each stitch flush with the edge of the white felt and sewing the stitches close together to create a solid block of orange.

Repeat this step for the second swan.

 

3. Cut a length of black embroidery thread and separate two strands, as before. Sew three stitches at the end of the swan’s beak, marking out a triangle (as pictured) then fill in the triangle with more stitches. Make sure you leave space to add the swan’s eye in the next step!

Then sew a small black stitch on the orange beak as pictured – in line with the top of the beak, and close to the wide end. Take care not to pull it too tightly and distort the orange stitches.

Repeat this step for the second swan – the swans should be roughly symmetrical but don’t worry if they look a little different!

4. Add a black seed bead eye to each swan, sewing each bead flat like an o with three or four stitches. Each eye should be positioned at the point of the black triangle, as pictured.

 

5. Cut out both swans, so they are framed by a few millimetres of blue felt. Use the newly cut out shapes as templates to cut matching pieces of felt – these will be the back of the clips/brooches.

 

6. Turn over the backing pieces of felt. Add a brooch clasp to each shape near the top of the swan’s body, making sure you leave space to sew around the edge of the felt later. Sew the clasps in place with a double thickness of matching blue sewing thread.

 

(If you're just making a swan brooch, skip to step 9)

7. Use a pair of small pliers to cut a length of jewellery chain approx. 11cm long (or sized to suit your collars).

 

8. Place the swan backs in front of you so they are facing each other. Hold one end of the chain in position (just under the “inside” end of the brooch clasp, as pictured) and use a double thickness of blue thread to securely sew the end link of the chain to the felt.  Repeat to sew the other end in position on the second swan back, joining the swans together.

Tip: When sewing the chain to the second swan, make sure the chain isn’t twisted!

 

9. Place the front and back of one of the swans together, and sew around the edge with blanket stitch (or whip stitch) and light blue thread. Lift the chain out of the way as you sew past it. Finish your stitching neatly at the back, then repeat this step to finish the second swan.

 

Click here to view the template sheet & print it at 100%.

This tutorial is for personal use only: you can use it to stitch as many swans as you want for yourself or as gifts, but please don't make any for sale. You may borrow a few photos if you want to blog about this project, but remember to credit me and link back to the original source, and do not reproduce my entire post or share the pattern itself on your site. Thanks!

Enjoyed this free tutorial? Buy me a "coffee" and help support my blog!


Subscribe to my newsletter for a monthly free pattern and visit my crafty tutorial archive for lots more free projects.

Visit my shop to buy my printable PDF sewing patterns:

A Patchwork Cross Stitch Update + Sewing in Italiano

Remember my patchwork cross stitch project?

I'm using small pieces of embroidery thread left over from other projects to stitch a mini patchwork "quilt" of random, colourful blocks.

 Here's how it looks at the moment:

It's great to be able to use up these scrappy bits of thread instead of just throwing them away, and it's a lot of fun seeing this develop organically as the months go by.

In other news, I got an excellent bit of post yesterday: a copy of the Italian edition of my first book! 

I'd been meaning to get a copy of this (and the German edition of my second book, which I blogged about the other day) for a while now but only just got round to ticking "buy those books!" off my To Do list.

It's really nice having these different editions sitting on on my bookshelf (the part of my bookcase which we jokingly refer to as my "ego shelf" as it contains my press clippings / portfolio folders plus all the books I've contributed to over the years)... but it's even nicer to think of all the happy felt-y things that will be being sewn in Germany & Italy because of them :)

Spot the Difference!

Can you spot the difference between these two copies of my second book, Super-Cute Felt Animals?

... yup, that's right, one of them is in German!

 

My first book, Super-Cute Felt has been translated into German, Dutch and Italian but each of those editions had a slightly different look than the original English edition (a hardback instead of a paperback, a slightly different cover, etc).

This time round though, Super-süße Filzfreunde: 35 Lieblingstiere nähen und besticken is almost identical - apart from being in a different language, of course! - which made it extra surreal to flick through when I got hold of a copy this week.

 

Most of the animals in the book have names - you can make "Frida the Forgetful Frog", "Lucy the Laughing Snail", "Sidney the Fluffy Squirrel", and so on. It's really fun to see the different names the animals have been given in this new edition!

For example, you can sew "Frieda, das fröhliche Flusspferd", "Gwendolin, die hungrige Giraffe", "Isidor, der glückliche Igel" and "Klara, die kichernde Krabbe":

 I also loved seeing the different animal sounds in the speech bubbles that are dotted through the book:

Wuff! Wuff! (instead of Woof! Woof! in the English edition)

Ruu-kuuhh! (Coo! Coo!)

Piep! Piep! (Cheep! Cheep!)

Schnapp! (Snap!)

 

Fancy making your own felt animals? Super-Cute Felt Animals is available to buy from Amazon UK, Amazon USA, The Book Depository and many other bookshops. Super-süße Filzfreunde is available from Amazon UK and Amazon DE and (hopefully!) many German bookshops :)

P.S. when the book came out I shared a series of free projects to mix and match with the designs in Super-Cute Felt Animals. You can find all the tutorials here.

Please note: the Amazon UK & USA links & Book Depository links in this post are affiliate links. 

Use It or Lose It: Unravelling

This week's crafting has been all about simple, relaxing projects - bits of restful craftiness squeezed into the start and end (and sometimes even the middle) of my working days.

Mostly I've been working on my patchwork blanket: using bits of yarn left over from other projects to make mini moss stitch squares to (very slowly) make a colourful, slightly chaotic blanket.

I've been knitting squares with bright yarn left over from my (still in progress) happy rainbow blanket, and with blue, white and grey yarn left over from my (now abandoned) attempt to record a year's weather in the medium of fluffy pompoms. In between knitting sessions, I've been sewing together the finished squares (and some I made earlier) and adding them to the blanket.

Inspired by my Use It or Lose It challenge, I've also admitted to myself that there are a couple of knitting projects on my "in progress" list that I'm never actually going to finish. So, I've unravelled them to put the yarn to good use as mini blanket squares.

This heap of yarn was originally going to be a stripey coffee cosy. I knitted it into stripes several years ago but never got round to turning it into a cosy like I'd planned... and now so many years have passed that I'm actually no longer friends with the person for whom it was going to be a gift! So, it's definitely time to abandon that particular project.

And this yarn? This used to be some patchwork squares, knitted by my mum 30+ years ago. She'd planned to make a blanket like this one but she never finished it. A couple of decades later I turned most of the squares into a trio of cushions that now have pride of place on the daybed in my studio.

There were a few extra squares left over that I never really knew what to do with. I made a half-hearted attempt to turn them into purses but never finished them - mainly, I think, because I was making "something" with them for the sake of it, rather than actually making something I wanted/needed.

It's great to be re-using the yarn my mum knitted with all those years ago, and especially to be knitting moss stitch squares just like hers!