An explosion of recycled magazine bows | How About Orange

January 12, 2010

An explosion of recycled magazine bows

Remember those instructions I posted for how to make gift bows from magazine pages? Yesterday I received an email from Katie Soltysiak, showing all the bows she's made with the tutorial. Fantastic! Each one is like a little work of art. To see more pictures, visit Katie's photo set at Flickr.

50 comments:

ardel claveria said...

making them are so addicting! i also tried using recycled gift wrappers, especially the ones with a nice pattern, and the bows turned out like designer toppers! thanks jessica for sharing this lovely idea :)

carolyn said...

My house also had an explosion of bows. I found this cool topo paper and we had map bows and holiday catalog bows. Thanks for the tut!!

Life Adorned said...

those are so great!!
i like how each of hers has a color theme.

Unknown said...

Those are much more fun than the ribbon bows. I may never go back! Thanks for the post!

khristian a. howell said...

what a clever idea!!! reuse reuse reuse revolution! the color is so much more fun with all the variety.

Grandma G said...

WOW!!

Lindsey Michelle said...

I LOVED that tutorial. It is so neat to see a whole bunch of these. I think one day I may dedicate some time to making a lot of bows so I have a stockpile ready for gifting.

Thanks again for the idea!

{ Lindsey }
greatfullday.blogspot.com

Bek said...

Pretty!

I made them with felt and leftover scraps of gift wrap. It was a bit time consuming with the felt because I was using hot glue (not as fast as just taping/stapling), but the result was amazing! It made each gift a little more special, I think

collected ideas said...

I have to say thank you for that Bow post. I love your blog and it helped inspired me to give the blog world a whirl. I wanted to say, Thanks for the inspiration!!!

Also - I created that bow MANY times since reading your post, and in many different ways. Thank you for that, too!

My first post back in October.
http://collectedideas.wordpress.com/2009/10/10/the-first-post-all-because-of-a-diy-bow/

Jessica Jones said...

Excellent, Kelly. Happy blogging!

Pam said...

seriously... so freakin cute!

Tresa said...

I made a few of the bows using your tutorial--it was fun! Thank you for the wonderful directions.

Nicole said...

I love this project, I used that tutorial to make all of my christmas bows!

elena said...

Wow! These are gorgeous. See what you've done..? Another happy hobby virus takes off from How About Orange..

HoneyB said...

I just joined blogspot... bored out of my mind until I discovered 'How About Orange'. A new favorite! I'm gonna click all your sponsors now =)

RedThreadDIY said...

Thanks for posting a link to my flickr set - and thanks again for providing the amazing tutorial!

Jennifer Katherine said...

What a great idea!!!!

CitricSugar said...

Holy wow! Those are awesome!!!

Anonymous said...

Awesome! I had the same 'bow explosion' happen in my living room! lol... and everyone loved them on their gifts this Christmas :)

Kathleen said...

i made some as well for all of our Christmas gifts, & they were a big oohed & ahhhed hit ! i love flocking back to your site for more inspiration :)

Angela Rae said...

I love this idea! I also love your blog. I want my blog to be like yours when it grows up.

Tim and Maria Jones said...

I thought you might like this post about someone else's love of orange: http://poppiesatplay.blogspot.com/2010/01/orange-crush.html.

Great blog, by the way! Totally inspiring!

Joanna said...

I absolutely love your blog and have nominated it for The Sunshine Award. :)

http://bakedbyjoanna.blogspot.com/2010/01/sunshine-award.html

Laurel said...

Wow- you just find the coolest stuff! I love this!! Gonna share:)
xo
Laurel

Anonymous said...

I thought you might like to hear about the new company that makes hand carved wooden blocks, ideal for fabric designing. Go to

www.theindianblockcompany.com

There are loads of blocks to choose from - to unleash your creativity.

Happy Block Printing!

stylefyles said...

These were a great idea. I totally yoinked it for myself!

http://stylefyles.tumblr.com/post/289190120/craftyfiles-a-finishing-touch

Thanks so much for the innovativeness!

huda said...

I don't usually try watever crafts i see, but as soon as i saw the post on how to do this, i just think i should do it myself! It was fun! I really love the idea! Thank you for sharing!!

Catherine @ waking up with you said...

Those look great! I showed my boyfriend your tutorial back in December and he ended up making bows using a Chinese newspaper he bought especially for the project. His family were very impressed when they received their Christmas gifts and heard that he'd made the ribbons.

Krista said...

those are fantastic! i can't wait to try my own!

Nicole-Lynn said...

They look great! Thanks for the inspiration1

Twiddle Thumbs said...

Gorgeous.
Gorgeous.

I blogged just before Christmas about this from your site, but never tried them.

It's time.

Sandy said...

I'm a high school art teacher. As students were finishing up their projects before the holiday, I taught them how to make your bows. I love to teach them ways to reuse and recycle, and this was such a welcome, timely post. They loved it! Thank you so much!

Sephora said...

a very nice and useful tutorial! I made lot of bows and I decorated all of my Christmas gifts with them!

oklyous said...

oh, that looks great! really good way of recycling magazines!

wishful nals said...

what an awesome idea!!!!!

jen said...

Funny - I made the EXACT same bow as the green one you show. The page was a magazine ad for some sort of natural laundry detergent. Too funny! I made this bow from a laundry ad because the present was cleaning related. No one probably knew but me, but I thought it was quite clever :) I think it'd be fun to have clues hidden in the bows.

Jessica Jones said...

No way! That's funny. And I hope your gift recipients discovered your cleverness. I love it.

Julie said...

So beautiful! I tried a few bows over Christmas, none picture worthy. I'm going to see if my 2nd grader can follow instructions and make a bow. She's pretty good with arts and crafts... Maybe it'll be onto her class as a craft project for their Valentine's party?!

sewvandervort said...

I made dozens of these bows also! So fun and each is unique!

Gayathri said...

I loved the tutorial. It is so neat to see a whole bunch of these. I wish to make a lot of bows so I have a stockpile ready for gifting. Keep blogging. Thanks.

Nickie Nix said...

I love it!
I couldn't even find my ruler, but I did a good estimate... just to see how it would look. I used colored printer paper. I can already see that I will be using these from now on. Thanks much!

EmbeeArqam said...

I tried these too! Used old google earth/map print outs. The final result is very cool~!

laissezfaire said...

Hoe beautiful!

Unknown said...

Thank you so much for that lovely idea, I used it for Xmas prezzies and people thought I was so clever! :D

Lei said...

How fun! i love recycling mag papers for projects! great idea.

Anonymous said...

i did not buy bows this christmas at all- just went through old magazines and followed the instructions. i am new to all things crafty or domestc but i loved making these. cheers for the post!

noah r said...

i have become addicted to making these, if for no other reason than the raised eyebrows of friends and the 'where did you get a kings of leon christmas bow?' comments. thanks!

Anonymous said...

very cool idea! thanks for the tutorial! I look forward to trying this out myself and sharing the info on my blog!

Tanya said...

I absolutely love these! Can't wait to give them a try.

guurrrl said...

Thank you for the amazing tutorial. I made a few of these last night out of very old recycled National Geographic magazines and Maps. They are turning out so nice! :D