Design*Sponge » Blog Archive » diy project: handcut felt mural

d*s reader mariana leung submitted this great diy project as part of this year’s diy contest. having recently purchased a new home (and spending “every dollar” she had to “make it livable”), mariana didn’t have a big budget left over for decoration, so she turned to her embroidery skills (which she uses in her career as an embroidery and fashion designer in nyc) to create this handmade felt mural for her wall. the best part? she created everything you see here with leftover felt scraps from previous projects- i love seeing what people can do when they reuse materials. thanks to mariana for sharing her project with us- click here for the full post with instructions or just click “read more” below. happy crafting! (stay tuned for another diy project at 2pm today)

Mariana’s Hand-Cut Felt Mural

Supplies:
-Several colors of craft felt (approximately $0.50 each). I used about 5.
-Painter’s tape (the blue kind)
-Sharp fabric scissors

This project started out with the goal of filling up a stark, blank wall in my new home. Having poured all of my funds into the purchase and renovation of my apartment in the Tudor-styled co-op of Hudson View Gardens, I was left with little money for decorative things.

I am an embroidery and fashion designer. When I moved, I didn’t have enough time to sort out all of my fabrics and art supplies while I packed, so I packed them all.

For this mural, I had pulled out a bunch of felt scraps and pieces left over from previous projects that would fit into my overall color scheme for the apartment. My inspiration was the wrought iron bowl I received as a wedding gift and some vintage Japanese fabric stencils I had in my collection.

1. First, I sketched out a rough layout of my design, and then worked out simple flower shaped templates on paper.

2. Next, I traced the flower shaped templates on the felt and started snipping away.

3. For the branches, I just roughly marked the brown felt in a layout that used my single piece of fabric that I had on hand in the most economical way possible.

4. I had half a roll of blue painters tape left over from my contractor. As I saw this mural as a temporary solution for my décor problem, I did not wish to damage the walls. I ripped slim pieces of the tape and attached them to the backs of the felt flowers and branches. The blue painters tape also allows you to move your mural elements around easily and you decide what arrangement you like best.

this is so great! what a wonderful way to re-use what you already have and make it totally personal! as someone who is about to leave a owned house for a rented apt, i will put this one in my inspiration files!

I am loving this. Am renting a room and have a whole wall I need to do something to. I think this is it. But, if you leave the painters tape on for too long, I think it’s quite difficult to remove without ruining the paint (?)

I have a big ugly wall in our house that needs a treatment. I was going to paint a sort mural, but now I’m thinking felt glued (or even sewed) on a stretched canvas instead of tape. Thanks for the idea!

farmgirlinnewmex: if you’re thinking of putting this on a canvas already, consider covering the canvas (or just a plain board) with felt first. The decorative little felt pieces will stick to it without any adhesive at all, but are completely repositionable. My mother made something like this for me when I was a kid and it provided hours of fun as a personal little theater.

I’m definitely trying this. My room at my dad’s place is really bare, and needs something pretty to give it oomph. I sort have a of blue-ey, floral thing going on in there, so this ought to be cool.

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