Polymer Clay Button Tutorial

These buttons are fun and easy to make. I have had good success with Sculpey Premo clay, but the directions work for any brand of polymer clay.

Step 1: condition/knead the clay until it's pliable and smooth
Step 2: roll it out or use a pasta machine to make it flat, about 3/16 of an inch thick. For my pasta machine, this is twice the thickest setting, I fold it in half and roll lightly with a roller when it comes out of the machine
Step 3: cut out shapes with mini cookie cutters or a knife. You can also make shapes by hand.
Step 4: emboss the shapes using a rubber stamp, I like the clear acrylic ones. Press firmly, but not so hard that you squish it, that takes some trial and error
Step 5: poke holes, I use the end of a narrow paintbrush handle. Pick up the button and push the paintbrush handle against your finger, and twist it, to make sure it goes all the way through.
Step 6: brush with 1-3 colors of Pearl Ex powders if you want a metallic look
Step 7: bake according to manufacturer's instructions.
Step 8: spray or brush a clear finish on to seal the powders, this is optional if you didn't use the powder.
As far as I know, they are not washable, but I haven't tried it.
Here are a few pictures of ways that I have used these buttons:

Click here for patterns to make quilted greeting cards and wall hangings!

This was a fun, quick project that uses kind of a confetti quilt technique for the petals. I also used Inktense for the words. I like that because I could stitch just outside the letters instead of on them, so they pop up more! Here are some process photos:

First, I drew the letters on paper,traced them on the fabric, and colored them with dry Inktense pencils.

Then activated the ink. Aloe vera gel or fabric medium work best on fabric, water tends to ‘bleed’. The letters are much brighter! Also, you can see my fairy frost background fabric better in this photo.

Now for the fun part! To make the fabric the petals are cut from, I started with a piece of lightweight fusible interfacing. I knew my petals would go into the seam on the edges, so I didn’t want it too stiff. With the glue side up, I covered it with some strips of fabric. You can go straight to the confetti pieces, but I think this saves time and thickness. Fuse them to the interfacing.

Then I added some random pieces, placing them mostly over the edges of the first fabrics to break up those long lines.

Ooooops! It looks like I forgot a photo... The next step is to add tulle, but you can see the fabric pieces under it. I didn’t use fusible web on the small pieces. You could, or just dab them with a glue stick. As for the tulle, you can do one layer, more than one, or wrinkle it up, which is what I did. I zapped it with a bit of 505 spray, but mostly used lots of pins!

Then, using a walking foot, I stitched some lines in random directions to hold everything together. You can also use free motion. I recommend a closed hole foot so the toes don’t catch in the tulle. After it was nailed down a bit, I added lots more lines, until I felt like it could be cut up without falling apart.

The back looks cool too! The thread color only changed because my bobbin ran out 😁

Next, I cut out petal shapes and a center and started arranging them. It was hard to picture what it would look like trimmed, so I took a photo and cropped it on my phone. Really helpful for placement!

The cropped photo made it more obvious that my top petal was too short, so I adjusted that by pulling it up a bit. I took a couple more photos and cropped them until I liked it.

Hmm, I see I missed a couple more photos... I stacked my top with batting and muslin (pre-backing), zig zag stitched around the petals, quilted the background and around the letters, and did some decorative stitching on the center. I then trimmed it square, but left a ‘bump’ where I planned to leave the hole for turning. This makes it much easier to fold those edges under! I placed the final backing on, right sides together, stitched all the way around except for the hole for turning, and clipped the corners. Two more tips! One, the backing does not have to be cut precisely, just use the edges of the quilt top as your guide for stitching, then trim the excess. Leave a ‘bump’ by the hole on that too! Two, it helps a lot to press the seam allowances by the hole before turning. (Photo below) A great trick I recently discovered!
After it’s turned and pressed, I usually cheat and close the hole with fusible web.
Let me know if you try it!