Quick Tips for Sewing with Felt

Today sharing a couple tips for sewing with felt.

Quick Tips for Sewing with Felt

Sewing with felt can be lots of fun. There are sooo many projects and patterns out there that use felt and felt comes in so many different pretty colours they’re hard to resist. However, felt can be a little tricky at times to sew; not difficult at all, but it likes to shift around a lot. Here are a few tips to keep in mind while sewing with felt.

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Tip #1

Use sharp scissors. Don’t use your good fabric scissors! Felt will dull them. I keep one pair of scissors separate just for using with felt, including a pair of embroidery scissors for the tiny spots. (These would be a good pair!*) 

Tip #2

Use freezer paper. Trace your pattern piece onto freezer paper, cut out and lightly (you don’t want to melt the felt!) iron the pattern piece to a piece of felt. Don’t cut the shape out of the felt yet! Depending on the project, I sew around the pattern piece then remove the freezer paper, and cut the object close to the stitching line. (Find some on Amazon here*)

Tip #3

Or if you’re making something like the maple leaf mug rug, cut the pattern shape out of the top layer only, pin the top (fabric) layer to the two layers of felt and sew around the edges of that. Finally, cut out the whole object as close to the stitching as possible without cutting the stitches. In the case of the maple leaf mug rug, if you cut the leaf shape out of all three layers, you may find the pieces have shifted before you finish leaving you with a distorted mug rug. This step is shown in better detail in the picture below from my star ornament tutorial:

As you can see the, the star shape was only cut from the fabric layer which I then pinned to two slightly larger pieces of felt.

Tip #4

Use good quality felt. Buy the best quality felt you can afford. I like to use wool-blend felt the best: it’s soft, comes in hundreds of pretty colours, and has very little pilling. Eco-fi felt can work too, but I don’t like it as much since it’s not as soft to the touch and not as dense. I’ll use Eco-fi for small details like eyes in a pinch, but for something that will be handled a lot (like the body of a stuffie) wool or wool-blend felt works best. Do not use the dollar store craft felt! It’s great for little kids’ crafts (although this is when I use the Eco-fi felt) but not if you want to use it for something you intend to be long-lasting.

Find wool felt on Etsy* (I recommend either from Gingermelon or BenzieDesign) or I’ve also purchased from Prairie Point Junction.

Bonus Tip:

Finally, just have fun sewing with felt! (Okay, fine, that’s not really a tip!) There are so many fun, and quick, projects you can use felt with like the Mini Felt Heart pins pictured below.

For more fun felt projects, check out some of my other tutorials below:

• Felt Penguin ornament or toy
• Felt Deer Applique ornament
• Maple Leaf Mug Rug
• Canadian Flag version of the Maple Leaf Mug Rug (on Patchwork Posse)
• Star Ornament
• Flower Petal Busy Bag activity
• Kitty Cat hair clip
• Pumpkin Finger Puppet (on Fleece Fun)

Want some more felt project ideas? I have a whole Pinterest board of felt projects you can check out. I’m always adding more projects so be sure to follow me so you’ll see all the new additions.

Ula writes for Lulu & Celeste