I have gone bowtie crazy! George has been after me for years to make him a bowtie. Evidently they are really hard to find and good ones are quite expensive. Then recently an old friend asked me whether I would make her some neckties from my fabric designs. I got a McCalls pattern that had both a necktie and a bowtie. Sad to say, I quickly realized that making the necktie was going to take more time than I had .. . But the bowtie — now that was a different story. It was far less complicated than the necktie, and took much less fabric. So here’s my first effort … what do you think? The fabric is one of my favorites, a design I made by kaleidoscoping my photograph of a purple laelia orchid.
Bowtie number one
Here’s the bowtie on the proud model, George.
George wearing bowtie number 1
Bowtie number two is also from the McCalls pattern. I used another of my favorite fabric designs, a kaleidoscope pattern from my photograph of a butterfly’s wing.
Bowtie number 2
How do you like it on George? For this one I used the standard bowtie hardware, a hook and clasp and adjustable slider. I had to order the hardware online because none of the local fabric stores carry it. Contact me if you want information about where I got the hardware.
George wearing bowtie number 2
Here’s my third bowtie. I found great instructions on a blog for boys’ bowties, and just made it a bit larger for a man-sized bowtie. This is a double fold tie. I haven’t had a chance to make the strap, so I’m using one of the bowtie clip-ons that I got when I ordered the other hardware sets.
Larger bowtie
This is the back, showing the clip-on hardware. You just slip the gizmo through the tube at the back and clip it onto each side of the shirt collar.
Back of bowtie showing clip-on
George was too tired to put on the shirt to model it, but I got some shots of him holding it up to his t-shirt. Here’s one:
Mr. Bowtie
And another … ! I figured out how to print the fabric for this design using letter-sized sheets of fabric, so I can whip up the bowties rather than waiting for yardage to be printed for me.
Honeybee design bowtie
This is a closeup of the center loop
Honeybee design bowtie center loop
This is the original file I used – my photograph of honeybees in a hive, kaleidoscoped into this design:
Honeybee kaleidoscope design
Tired of bowties yet? Okay, just one more. My latest is made of fabric I designed from my photograph of a swallowtail butterfly wing. I kaleidoscoped a small part of the photograph using the Kaleider software program (see my other blog posts about Kaleider). I love how brightly colored the fabric turned out –
Swallowtail bright bowtie
I just started showing the bowties in my Etsy store. Click here for my first listing. I can also make them to order from any of my fabric designs, so contact me if you want to special order one.
