Raise your hand if you’re an 80’s child! Or an 80’s teenager or an 80’s adult! If you were alive in the 80’s you know all about fashion staples of that decade: massively oversized T-shirts, legwarmers, pegged jeans and  puffy and wrinkly fabric covered hair elastics. Bit by bit, 80s styles are coming back into fashion, so channel your inner 80s child and learn how to hand sew a scrunchie for some fab DIY style! 

Even a beginner with very basic hand sewing skills can do this project. These DIY scrunchies are so easy to sew by hand that you can make a bunch for you and your daughter both! Or make a bunch for gifts this summer! Scrunchies are back in style!

Watch the full video tutorial below for a very detailed explanation of how to hand sew a scrunchie, or continue reading for a more abbreviated photo tutorial! 

Materials:

• 45 x 8 cm (18 x 3″) strip of fabric
• 25 cm (10″) elastic*
• polyester thread*
• hand needle*
• safety pin*
• pins*

How to hand sew a scrunchie:

1. Fold the strip of fabric in half, right sides facing, and pin together the long sides.

2. Sew along the pinned side. You can sew this with a sewing machine or by hand. I prefer using a backstitch, but you could also sew a whipstitch around the raw edges.

To sew the back stitch, simply insert the needle a little to the right of where the thread comes out, and pull the needle back out a bit to the left of the thread, as seen above. The video above shows how to do this useful hand stitch.

3. Sew all the way to the other end, knot and cut the thread.

4. Stick the safety pin into the seam allowance at one end of the tube.

5. Stick the safety pin into the fabric tube and push it through to the other end. To do this, scrunch the fabric and grab the pin through the fabric as you un-scrunch the fabric.

6. Cut the elastic. I used 5 mm (1/4″) woven elastic, but you can use any type you like. 

7. Stick a safety pin into the end of the elastic and feed it through the tube as you did in step 5 to turn the tube of fabric.

Make sure you hold on to the other end of the elastic so that it doesn’t get pulled inside the fabric tube. I hold the end down with my pinky and ring finger against my palm.

8. Pull the two elastic ends out from the fabric tube.

9. Knot the elastic, leaving tails about 5 cm (2″) long.) Trim the elastic, then move it and the fabric around to move the knot away from the fabric opening.

10. Adjust the fabric so that the seam is untwisted and so that it matches up at the ends, as shown by the arrows above.

11. Fold the edges of one tube end in, so that the raw edges are inside. Then insert the other end inside the other opening, as shown by the arrows above.

12. Sew around the opening, going around in a circle, catching fabric from each tube end as you go.

And your scrunchie is ready to wear!

Create a cool hairstyle (like mine below, right?!) with your brand new scrunchie! Knowing how to hand sew a scrunchie is so awesome because you can customize them in many ways. Use wider or more narrow fabric to adjust how wide the scrunchie is, or make the strip longer to make it even more scrunched up. Or adjust how wide open it can stretch by cutting the fabric AND elastic proportionally longer or shorter.

But the most important thing is to have fun!

If you love making easy and fun hair accessories, why not try this incredibly simple, no-sew headband and infinity scarf set from an old t-shirt?! It’ll take you maybe… 10 or 15 seconds?! So cool! Find out how here!

If you want to make some really gorgeous scrunchies, check out these amazing DIY pompom scrunchies by my friend Vicky Myers!

Do you want all the new sewing techniques and cool modern sewing projects, crafty tutorials and free sewing patterns? Then sign up for the Cucicucicoo Newsletter here for access to dozens of free printables! 

And, of course, if you liked learning how to hand sew a scrunchie, click here now to save this tutorial on Pinterest!

 

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