Ideas for using buttons

Changing the buttons on an existing garment is one of the most effective ways of making it special and unique.
I will share some examples of how I have used my handmade buttons on the garments I customise, and some of them don’t even require you to make buttonholes!
Here are some of my buttons used as decoration, rather than functioning as fastenings.

I used some of my SMALL buttons on this military style jacket, they are for decoration only, the jacket actually fastens with hooks and eyes. I hand stitched the horizontal strips with different coloured threads.

I stitched the lace butterflys to the jacket then added my SMALL buttons, and 2 strips of fabric that are used to tie the jacket together.

I cut the black and white leaves from a piece of fabric and stitched them to the neck of the red dress, I then added some of my SMALL buttons which reminded me of berries 🙂

2 of my SMALL buttons added to the pockets of this denim waistcoat.

3 SMALL buttons added just for decoration on this boiled wool jacket, the pocket is made from a felted jumper and the lemon on the elbow is a rubber coaster!

This jacket fastens with a zip but I added some embroidered patches and some of my SMALL buttons to add some interest.

This jacket has tiers to fasten it, but I added some of my MEDIUM buttons as well. The decoration down the front and on the pockets is made from my ART RIBBON , I have some for sale, you can see it here

This jacket already had buttons to fasten it, but they were a bit boring, so I added some of my MEDIUM buttons in the spaces between the original ones. This is a good way to add interest without having to make bigger buttonholes.

Some of my glittery MEDIUM buttons, added purely to add a bit of pzazz!

This jacket fastens with hooks and eyes, but I added some of my LARGE buttons to turn it into something special.

I used SMALL and LARGE buttons in the centres of the circles I added to this coat.

Of course I also use my buttons as actual buttons, here are some examples…

I have used my LARGE buttons on these denim jackets, I needed to make the buttonholes bigger to fit them, so whilst I was at it I added some decoration to the button holes, and behind the buttons.

I added a bit of handstitching to these button holes.

I created a loop of ribbon to make a fastener to fit these LARGE buttons.

I used LARGE buttons to create a closure for this jacket…

and a small and large button for this one….

The existing buttons on this jacket were really hard to open and close, so I made new loops that could accomodate my SMALL buttons. I did some hand embroidery on them with variegated thread.
You can see more photos in this blogpost