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How To Make A Bow Board

How To Make A Bow Board - {The Ribbon Retreat Blog}

How To Make A Bow Board - {The Ribbon Retreat Blog}

There are a few different ways to make a bow board.
This is one of the easiest ways, and I love how the frame turns your bows into art!

As you might know, I don’t have any girls.
So sad considering making bows is a stress reliever. 🙂

The Ribbon Retreat has a Youtube Channel coming soon with lots of video tutorials.
Exciting, yes?!

Well, this bow board was made for those videos.

Maybe someday they will hold the bows of a little girl.
For now, they will hold bows for decoration. 🙂

Have you been needing to make one for your little princess?
Here is your chance! You will see just how easy these are.

– Supplies –

Frame (Any Size)
Spray Paint
Fabric (Amount depends on your size frame.)
Hot glue/Glue gun
Ribbon/Ric Rac
Marker

The first thing you do is find a frame you love.
It can be new or second-hand.

As you can tell in the picture below, mine was second-hand. 🙂
I was looking for a frame that had beautiful detail,
and I couldn’t care less what was inside.

I pulled the picture apart, leaving just the frame.

I was pretty lazy and did absolutely nothing to get it ready for painting.
You may want to clean, sand, etc. depending on the condition of your frame.

The spray paint I used was a white spray paint from Walmart.
It was a primer and paint in one. Gotta love easy!

The weather here in Utah has been crazy warm.
It was warm enough for me to spray paint outside – in a t-shirt too!
When the weather isn’t cooperative, I usually do it in the garage.

I probably gave it about 4-5 coats of paint.
The swirls in the frame were hard to cover.
Paint until you like how it looks.

*Sigh* Much better!

Love that detail!

The next thing we are going to do is attach our fabric to the back of the frame.

The amount of fabric you need, depends on the size of your frame. Remember that fabric is usually about 42″ wide. Use this to decide how many yards you will need. I got one 1/2 yard for my frame.

My frame was very different, but most frames will have something
cardboard-like holding the picture inside the frame.

We will hot glue our fabric to that piece.

The fabric I chose for my bow board is Pink Sorbet Houndstooth in Sophie by Chez Moi for Moda.
I love this line!

Cut your fabric down so you have about two inches extra around the back of the frame.
Make sure to pay attention to the pattern of the fabric.
If you want it laying a certain way, double check that here.

Apply hot glue to the center on one side.
Pull up the fabric and press it on the hot glue.

Do the same thing exactly across from where you started.
Make sure to pull it taut.

Make your way towards the outside, switching sides,
going back and forth across the frame.

Each time pull on the fabric keeping it taut.

It should look like this when you finish those two sides.

Now follow the same technique with the other two sides.

Cut off any excess fabric.
I left a little bit on the corners so I could glue them down separately.

Once the corners were glued, I cut off the excess fabric there as well.

Now we are ready to add our ribbons! 🙂

I don’t have a ton of bows, so I just did two ribbons straight down.

I used 1 1/2″ Lemongrass/White Moonstitch Ribbon.
The crochet edge is beautiful! It is only $4.25 for five yards of this beautiful ribbon.
And we also carry Polka Dot Moonstitch Ribbon!

You can turn the board and have a lot of ribbons going up and down, you can do criss crosses,
anything you’d like.

You can use Ribbon, and of course check out our HUGE selection of awesome priced ribbon for this project! You can also use Ric Rac, or even Lace! Be creative.

I didn’t do anything scientific to figure out how much ribbon I needed.
I just rolled the ribbon along the fabric and cut when I had enough.

Make sure to measure where you want your ribbons to go.

Measure and then mark your spots.
I divided the side by 3 and marked those spots.
Then hot glue your ribbon on one side, then on the other.

I turned the back over and then hot glued the other ends of the ribbons.
I measured this, but I also double checked by eyeballing it.
Sometimes I should not trust my measurements. 🙂

Once you’re finished with gluing on your ribbons,
put the back on the finished frame.

What a change! I love it!

Bye bye Moose (Husband says it’s an elk… is he right? :)), Hello bows!

How To Make A Bow Board - {The Ribbon Retreat Blog}

How To Make A Bow Board - {The Ribbon Retreat Blog}

How To Make A Bow Board - {The Ribbon Retreat Blog}

This is an easy, fun project that anyone can do.
Especially with the help of our beautiful Designer Fabrics and awesome quality Ribbons!

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22 Comments

  1. Shannon Feehery
    Posted January 23, 2012 at 7:03 pm | Permalink

    I love this can’t wait to make.

  2. Posted January 23, 2012 at 8:33 pm | Permalink

    I’d say bye to the moose, the antlers look like moose antlers! HELLO cutie pie bows =) Wish I’d had one a few years back for my bows. Now my baby is 31.♥♫

    • Shirley
      Posted January 23, 2012 at 9:17 pm | Permalink

      One vote for Moose! Thanks Marilyn! 🙂

  3. Chrystie
    Posted January 24, 2012 at 8:47 am | Permalink

    Great idea, although I think I’ll need one twice the size for all the bows for our 4 girls:) Do you have a tutorial for the cute style of bow in the green moonstitch ribbon? I have some adorable polka dot moonstitch just begging to be made into bows!

    • Shirley
      Posted January 24, 2012 at 10:00 am | Permalink

      Hi Chrystie! Yes, most people would have to find something a little bigger. 🙂 I would have made something bigger if I only had a girl. 🙂 The bow is just a Twisted Boutique style bow. I made it using the TOTT instructions way, but I do have a simple Twisted Boutique tutorial to make this type of bow. I am not sure if it will turn out the same, but it should be very close! And the Polka Dot Moonstitch would be beautiful in it! Click the links to take you to the tutorials. 🙂

  4. Jodi Taylor
    Posted January 24, 2012 at 9:53 am | Permalink

    Looks great. I’ve made a few without a back and yours look so much nicer. Definately finishes the frame better.I’ll do this next time. BTW – It’s definately a moose!!

    • Shirley
      Posted January 24, 2012 at 9:57 am | Permalink

      Thank you! You know what’s funny? My husband now has no recollection of the conversation and says he doesn’t even remember looking at the Moose picture. That is what I call defeat. 🙂

  5. Posted January 24, 2012 at 9:54 am | Permalink

    So adorable! I love the pink and green together:) Cute!!

  6. Posted January 24, 2012 at 8:56 pm | Permalink

    So lovely! Btw, as a way of saying THANK YOU for making the Socal Social event last October, I featured your biz here. I was one of the participants and your special gift made the event totally cool.

    • Shirley
      Posted January 24, 2012 at 9:36 pm | Permalink

      Hi SJ! Thank you so much for the feature! We really appreciate it! I am so glad that you loved our sponsorship of the SoCal Social. We really want to support craft bloggers and creative crafters. Let us know if there is anything we can do for you! 🙂

  7. Dorothy
    Posted January 28, 2012 at 9:50 am | Permalink

    I love it!!! I can’t wait to make it for my daughters. Thanks so much.

  8. Michelle Taylor
    Posted February 2, 2012 at 10:45 am | Permalink

    This is absolutely beautiful. I pray one of my friends will have a girl lol

  9. Posted February 4, 2012 at 5:42 am | Permalink

    I love it!! I’m going to do my order right now 🙂

    Best wishes from Madrid,

  10. sisy
    Posted February 28, 2012 at 3:46 am | Permalink

    Wow.. it’s cool. you’re so creative.

  11. Carmen
    Posted March 20, 2012 at 7:16 am | Permalink

    Ah! Finally a bow holder that is super cute and even better…easy to make! Thank you!!

  12. esther
    Posted April 3, 2012 at 6:12 pm | Permalink

    how much fabric will i need to make a bow board using an 11×14 frame?

    • The Ribbon Retreat
      Posted April 3, 2012 at 6:37 pm | Permalink

      Hi Esther, you could use a fat quarter and that would work perfectly. Those are 18″ x 22″. If you don’t have access to a fat quarter, you would need 11″ or 1/2 yard, but you would have lots extra if you did that. Hope this helps!

  13. Posted April 11, 2012 at 7:02 pm | Permalink

    This bow board is so cute and looks easy to make. great job!

  14. Alicia Falling
    Posted June 8, 2012 at 9:22 pm | Permalink

    I made my bow board today and it turned out perfect! I would love to send u a picture but I don’t know where I would send it to. Thanks so much for the cute idea!

  15. connie campisi
    Posted July 18, 2012 at 8:35 pm | Permalink

    Definately a male moose. Elk don’t have the beard hanging down or broad antlers.
    Connie

    • The Ribbon Retreat
      Posted July 18, 2012 at 10:26 pm | Permalink

      Thanks Connie! 🙂

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