DIY papercut name bunting

Apologies for the lack of posts last week, I really wanted to have this craft ready much earlier but the twins aren’t napping well at the moment so that means my “blogging time” is much reduced! However, finally it is done :)

Let me introduce my tutorial for papercut name bunting!

I’ve been planning to do name bunting for the babies’ room for a while now and over time it’s taken different forms in my head, but after seeing this picture (below) on the Heart Handmade UK blog I decided to do a papercut version!

I have to admit that my previous attempts at papercutting haven’t been particularly amazing, so I was definitely keen to keep it very simple this time! Even so, it ended up taking me quite a long time. I chose to draw the outline of each flag in Photoshop Elements before cutting it all out by hand. I think you could do this craft an awful lot quicker than I did if you either know how to use Photoshop (I am very much a beginner) or drew the letters and shapes out by hand. For the really sophisticated among you, you could cut out the letters with a Silhouette or similar papercutting machine and then it would be a really quick craft!

Anyway, this is how to make your own name bunting using the method that I did…

For this tutorial you will need:

• Photoshop Elements
• Printer
• Coloured paper
• Craft knife
• Ruler
• Ribbon
• Glue (I used dry roller glue)

1. Choose your pattern design. I chose to have a zigzag cutout on each letter, so I found a jpeg of a zigzag pattern on Google to use as my background pattern. The pattern was larger than I wanted so I created an A4 size image in Photoshop (as this is the size of the paper I want to print onto) and repeated the pattern to fill the image. Save as a jpeg and name this Photoshop layer ‘Fill layer’.

2. Create a new layer in Photoshop and draw the outline of the bunting triangles. Keep this layer at the top at all times. I used the ‘snap to grid’ option and the rulers to make sure that the triangles were the right size. My triangles were 12cm wide and 12cm high. I added a 1.5cm tab to the top of each triangle for attaching to the ribbon to make bunting.

3. Use this tutorial to create letters in Photoshop Elements with the zigzag pattern in (ignore step 7, we don’t need this). I used the font Tondu from dafont.com which created nice, simple, bold letters.

NOTE 1: In order to position each letter separately within each triangle, I quickly discovered I needed a separate layer for each letter, and consequently a separate (repeated) fill layer.

NOTE 2: The tutorial above uses some sort of grouping function (Ctrl + G) to make the patterned fill layer only show through where the letters are. I found that once you have applied the grouping function, even if you un-apply it, you cannot reposition the letters – so make sure they are where you want them to be to start with! If you are going to do what I did, and make several versions of the same image with different letters (if you want more than 3 letters in your bunting), find your widest or largest letter (in my case ‘k’, but if you are using an ‘m’ this might be the one to use) and use this to determine the position and size of your letter in each triangle. The snap function and rulers make it easier to consistently place letters in the same place in each triangle. Then change the letters to the ones you want.

4. Save the Photoshop image as a jpeg and then edit the letters in the Photoshop file to create additional pages of letters, saving each one as a jpeg when you are done. I wanted my letters to be a mix of colours so I selected certain letters for certain pages (I needed 11 letters in total). I found the best way to edit each letter was to:

• Click on the associated fill layer to select it
• Click on the eye on the fill layer to hide it
• Press Ctrl + G to ungroup the layers
• Edit the letter
• Click on the fill layer again and press Ctrl + G again
• Click on the eye on the fill layer to unhide it

5. Print out each page of letters on coloured paper.

My bunting was destined to be hung against a wall so you won’t be able to see the back of it. Therefore, I printed the image backwards so any visible print lines will be hidden on the back of the bunting. Luckily Photoshop has a nice feature for printing an image in reverse: Print > More Options > Iron-on Transfer, then check the box which says ‘Flip Image’.

Annoyingly, after carefully sizing my triangles, I didn’t realise that Photoshop had re-sized my image for printing so they came out slightly smaller! To avoid this, check the setting ‘Select Print size’ is set to ‘Actual Size’.

6. Using a craft knife, first cut out the patterned letters on each page (this makes it easier to cut the fiddly bits).

Then cut around the bunting outlines, leaving you with a bunch of triangles with tabs.

7. Score along the line between the triangle and the tab on each piece, and fold. I used the back edge of the craft knife for scoring but a bone folder or similar might be better.

8. Leaving a nice long end to hang your bunting with, start gluing your triangles to your ribbon. I used a dry roller glue as this will not crinkle the paper. I firstly glued the ribbon to the top of the triangle, and then glued the tab down over the ribbon. Be careful to glue the triangles on the right way round – I started gluing mine on backwards and had to start again!

Be sure to keep the spacing between your triangles even. I used a gap of 1 inch between each triangle.

9. Once you have finished gluing the triangles in place, cut your ribbon to length and hang your bunting!

I was really pleased with how it turned out! I think my bunting is pretty cute, and it looks great in the babies’ room. I hope you like it too! Let me know if you have a go at making your own. You could write any word or phrase with it. It would be great for a wedding or a party, don’t you think?

Thanks for reading!

Rachel