DIY Vintage Button Silhouette Pet Portraits

Hi guys! Welcome to day four of my 12 Days of Handmade Gifts! Today I am going to share this fun button project with you! I LOVE vintage buttons and have a ton of them! They are one of the things I seem to always collect. I wanted to make a silhouette portrait of Beaureguard and Sadie for gifts for Christmas this year, and I thought it would be fun to go one step further and make the silhouettes with buttons. This project is really quite simple and the end result is pretty cool. This is definitely a great gift to make for your favorite pet lover, or for yourself with your favorite pet!

Here’s What You Need:

*Frames

*Chipboard

*Fabric

*Buttons

*Hot Glue

*Tracing pen, pencil, chalk

*Pet photos, profile views

*Scissors

Instructions:

The first thing you need to do is print out your pet photo. Print out the photo to the size that fits your frame. The next thing you do, is cut out your pet in the photo. This is your silhouette. Now, trace around the photo onto your fabric with a marking pen or pencil. Cut your fabric to size and glue it to your chipboard piece that has been cut to size as well. Now lay out your first layer of buttons. Fill in the major areas and then when you are happy with the layout glue the buttons down. Then, start filling in the areas with more buttons, glueing them down to cover the sparse areas. Keep gluing them down until you have covered the entire area of the silhouette smoothly and there is a good dimensionality there. To finish off your pet art, just pop the button art in the frame and close up the back.

Don’t you just love them! I think I like the one with the mother of pearl buttons the best. Sadie’s little profile is too sweet! This project is really easy, and can be completed in about an hour or so.  You can customize these fun silhouettes just by the fabric choice you use for the background and the color and style of buttons. I hope some of you pet lovers out there will give this one a go. It’s a lot of fun! I’ll be back tomorrow with another fun gift project. Until then…

Happy Crafting!