A few days ago I told you about some cute flowers and things I bought from etsy. This is the first thing I have made using some of those supplies – a pretty floral corsage! It was really simple to make and it was fun to be working with such sweet little flowers and berries. With this sort of corsage you could probably just go nuts with a glue gun to stick everything together, but I prefer sewing to gluing as I think it gives a neater, higher quality finish. If you are a beginner at sewing but have been following my Learn to Sew posts, this is a simple project to use you new skills on. Here’s what you’ll need to make a brooch like this:
- A large fabric flower (bought or handmade)
- A selection of other smaller flowers, berries and leaves with wire stems
- Brooch pin
- Felt in a colour to match your corsage
- Hand sewing needle and thread
- Wire cutters or strong scissors
You could use a bought fabric flower as your main focal point, or you could make one yourself. I hand made the rose that I am using, because I wasn’t really happy with the texture of the rose that I bought. But as you can see, they’re pretty similar, so feel free to just use a bought flower.
Play around with the flowers and other bits and pieces to create an arrangement you like.
Twist the stems of the leaves together to form two bunches, one with two leaves and the other with three leaves. If your small flowers are bunched together like mine are, carefully remove the wrapping holding them together to separate the individual stems. With the berries, create two bunches of two berries by twisting the stems together keeping one single berry stem. Twist the two bunches of leaves together, cut off the excess wire and curve the ends around to form a bit of a loop.
Cut out two identically sized pieces of felt in a circle or oval shape to form the back of your brooch. Thread your needle and hand sew the leaves to one of the felt pieces (put the other piece of felt aside for now). Your stitching doesn’t have to be neat, it just has to hold the leaves in place.
Take some of your stems of flowers and arrange them on the brooch base. As a general rule, arrangements of odd numbers are more aesthetically pleasing than even numbers, so I am using three stems of the flowers. Cut off the excess wire and curve the ends around to form a sort of hook. Now you can hand sew them on top of the leaves by stitching over the stems, like you did for the leaves. By hooking the ends of the stems it prevents any possibility of the stems being pulled out, which may happen if the stems were still straight.
Now add your berries in the same manner! Don’t worry if your stitches are looking messy, you’ll cover them up soon.
Take your fabric flower and sew it onto the base by sewing through the outer petals and through the felt. This way the base of the petals will be pulled close against the base and all the messy stems and stitches will be covered.
Your corsage should by looking pretty spiffy by now, but the back looks a bit of a mess.
This is where the other piece of felt comes in. Use a simple running stitch to sew it to the back of the brooch. This extra layer of felt not only covers the stitches, but also gives your corsage a stronger, more stable backing.
Now you can sew the brooch pin to the back of the corsage.
Now your corsage is finished! A pretty corsage like this would make a lovely gift, or keep it for yourself and wear it with a simple outfit to give it a colourful boost.
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Wow, that’s lovely! I love the simple way you’ve come up with to clean the back, it’s so easy yet looks perfect. Thanks for sharing this, I’ll definitely put it into practice!
Wow! I’m impressed by this corsage brooch, lovely!!! I just discovered your blog and shop via our creative spaces and I’ve become one of your fan
How pretty, you certainly have a gift in your hands.