How to make hair bows : 10 easy ways to beautiful hairbow accessories

Ever heard about the Jojo bows? – and the little girl Jojo Siwa who made hairbows trendy in the US. She proclaims hairbows are  “more than just a hair accessory, it is a symbol of power, confidence, believing-ness”.

As one who wears it all the time and convinces others to wear them as well and makes a fortune out of them, she would know.

You can make these cute (little as well as big) hair bows so easily at home. Hair bows are the perfect accessory to that perfect outfit – be it on a barrette enhancing the beautiful frock worn by a little girl or on the top of a clip you yourself can wear.

What do you need to make those pretty hair bows?

• Ribbons or fabric to make the bows. Ribbons are the favorite to make hair bows, though you can make bows with fabric as well, as you will see in this tutorial. Grosgrain ribbons are the favorite for these bows as they are thicker, durable and sturdier than ordinary ribbons and look quite good too. Check out this post on the different types of ribbons on more details on what you can use to make the hairbows.
• Hair accessories – Barrettes and French clips, tic tac clips (snap clips), alligator clips, bobby pins, comb clips, butterfly clips, fabric, plastic /metal hairbands, thin slides, hair pins and hair ties and scrunchies to attach the hair bows.
• Glue – really strong and fast drying glue – instant glue is better but be careful with the hands
• Sewing needle and thread in matching colours
• Other odds and ends to embellish the bows like buttons, sequins and beads, rhinestones etc

10 Different ways to make Hairbows

1. Make a Tailored Hair bow 

Materials you will need to make this fabric bow

1. One fabric piece  of Width = atleast 1/2 ” more than the clip you have

Length – Calculate at least 1 inch more than the clip metal width ; then double this and add 1/2 inch seam allowance

2. Ribbon in matching colour -1/4 inch or 1/8 inch wide ribbon or fabric piece – 1 inch long or as needed – to tie the middle of the bow

• The metal hardware of a clip
• Glue for metal
• Hand sewing needle and thread matching the fabric

Step 1

Fold the edges of the long side of the fabric 1/4 inches to the back of the fabric. Press in place.

Now bring these edges to the middle and press . Stitch the short sides closed. on both sides. Clip and trim the seam allowance.

Turn the piece right side out through the gap along the folded edges. 
Clip the corners.

Make sure that the corners are all pushed out – use your seam ripper to push the corners pointed from the inside. Press carefully

Using a slip stitch close the opening shut – this is optional. For small bows, when the bow is tied this gap will be invisible from the front.

Step 2

Use a thread to tie a knot in the center

Step 3

You can attach the middle tying ribbon now or later. If you are attaching it to clips you can tie the center ribbon later along with the metal bar of the clip.

If attaching the bow to a barrette or pin attach the ribbon now. It is your convenience.

Glue the bow to the front of the hair clip. Wait till the glue is dry

Step 4
If using clips and you want a firmer bond than the one you get with the glue, insert the ribbon to the center of the bow and loop through the arched string of the clip. Stitch the ribbon edges together, Using the hand needle and thread . Give two or three anchoring stitches to stitch the bow to the band at the back. The seam will be in the back now ofcourse.
Your bow hair clip is ready.

An alternative way is to just bring the short edges to the middle and then stitch. This is a bigger bow good for attaching on hair clips. The photographs below are from the post on  making super simple hair accessories from old things at home

Keep the 7 inch by 3 inch fabric piece rightside up in front of you.

Bring the short edges together and sew along the top edge – the red lines are the sewing lines.

This is what you get.

Bring the thing rightside out through the opening.

Using simple thread gather and tie in the middle.Use a thin ribbon to tie over the thread and pretty it up.

2. Simple & easy to make ribbon bow

If you are using ribbon to make the bows the advantage is that the side edges are already finished. Some folds and nips and knots and gluing are all that are needed to make bows of many kinds

To make the simplest bow for regular barrettes you  should take 3 inches long, 3/4 inch wide ribbon and another 1/4 or 1/8 inch wide ribbon which is 1 inch long

Fold the short edges to the middle overlapping slightly about 1/4 inch. Tie around the middle with thread first and then tie over it with the small piece of ribbon.There is your simple ribbon bow

3. Ribbon Bow – double layered

This bow is similar to the earlier ribbon bow but with more layers. You will be making two such ribbon bows and laying it on another ribbon cut in a shape as in the picture below. Tie them all together 

As mentioned in the first bow, the french clips have a small spring under which you can wrap the tying ribbon – this will firmly attach the bow to the clip. You should also use glue before this.

4. Loopy bow or Pageant style hair bow 

To make this cute bow Cut many ribbon pieces about 8- 10 inches long. You can take any width ribbon. If the width is less you will need more number of ribbon pieces for it to look puffy. 

Fold it by half and cut out the sides as in the picture below – this is to avoid the bulk at that end, when everything is gathered.

Bring the ends to the middle and glue in place. Now fold the pieces and gather all the pieces together and stitch together.

5. Cheerleading Bows

This is also known as a Boutique bow – it has the look of a tied sash bow. Check out the post on tying a sash bow properly if you would  rather have the original. This faux bow look just like the original at half the effort.

To make this bow, take a long length of ribbon – about 20 inches for a medium bow like mine. Cut the edges to the inside or to the side in an angle. With a cigarette lighter or candle harden the edges to prevent fraying

Fold this ribbon by 3 so that the ends are at the bottom and on top. Now pinch it by the middle and Tie in place with a thread

Take another piece of smaller ribbon and tie a knot in the middle 

Manipulate the ends to the bottom so that they hang down as if you have manually tied the ribbon

Wrap the knotted ribbon over the thread in the middle – this will give the look of a naturally tied ribbon bow. Cut out extra and Stitch in place at the back.

You can take some 35 inches for a 1.5-inch wide bow, 21 inches for a 1-inch wide bow. 

6. Corker bows ( Curled ribbon bow)

Any ribbon you have can be turned to such curls with a simple trick – microwave it wrapped on a pencil. Take a useless pencil ( because when you microwave it the paint on the surface will peel) and wrap ribbon on it – a 35-inch long ribbon will give you some 20-inch long curls.

On the pencil, You will have to secure the end of the ribbon with stitching at the end.

Microwave for 1 1/2 minutes and you will get curled ribbon like this. You will have to do several trips to get many such. Just gather these by the middle and tie for a really curled bow

7. Easy baby bow

To make this baby bow cut out 10 inches long ribbon. Mark the ribbon as in the picture below – this is for making running stitches for gathering. 

Make long running stitches along this line with hand sewing thread and needle.

At the end of it, pull the thread and your ribbon will gather like this. Cut the short ends at an angle

Attach cute buttons or bead or anything you want to make this baby bow more attractive

8. Gathered bow

To make the gathered bow take a long piece of ribbon ( I tool 15 inch ) and attach lace to both the long ends. Gather this ribbon with long basting stitches and then secure stitch in place so that the gathers are not lost.

9. Yoyo fabric  bow

This is a cute rounded bow made with fabric.

To make this bow Cut out a 10 inch or bigger circle of fabric. Make a yoyo with it as shown in the picture below

Gather it by the middle with a ribbon piece. There you have it – a nicely rounded bow for your hair accessory

Related post : How to fabric yoyos

10. Medallian Bow.

To make this you need a fabric flower and some ribbon pieces to make the loops around and thinner ribbons for hanging

Bring the ends of the ribbons to the center and glue them there.

Stack these ribbon loops in a flower shape. Glue every layer at the middle

When you have a flower shape, glue the fabric flower in the middle and stitch the thin hanging ribbons in the back

Related posts :

• Decorate your plain hair clips and tic tac clips
• 7 ways to make fabric bows 
• Make more ribbon bows – 7 easy tutorials
• Different types of hair accessories