Rousched Silk Flowers Tutorial

Introduction: Here, I've decided to post a tutorial on my blog on how I make these rousched flowers. What is rousching? It's basically just gathered fabric for embellishing. In the Victorian era, it was very popular in clothes. Ruffles and lace and frills. Even men got into it.

You can make rousched flowers with bias cut silk ribbon or the cheaper way, with rousched silk fabric. This is a very inspirational way of embellishing. The possibilities are endless. It's a good day. And this is a day to be inspired to spread beauty around the world with art. There are nine simple steps to making these lovely flowers.

Step 1. Here are the supplies you'll need for the basic rousched flower: silk fabric cut on the bias or bias cut silk ribbon (the fabric is cheaper) thread or floss of the same color as the fabric, a beading needle, and beads (beads are optional). I prefer a beading needle, because it glides through the fabric nicely. AND I like to use beads at the end when the flower is all done.

The bigger you cut the fabric, the bigger your flowers will be. I usually cut my fabric to 1 inch X 3 1/2 inches or linger. Whatever. I'm not too picky about it, as you can tell. But they should be cut to what you see to your left. It's not an exact measurement.



Step 2. Fold the fabric in half long ways and make a running stitch along the raw edge. You should be going through two pieces of fabric. Easy!!

Step 3. Now just pull to gather your fabric. Look!! It's already coming into a circle!













Step 4. Now this part is a little tricky and hard to explain. We want to make a circle, so we need to sew the ends together. We don't want any raw edges showing on top. So, again, with just a simple running stitch, put the two edges together ("right on right", for those who sew), and pull the thread through without gathering. But you can pull the center of the flower to gather it nice and tight. Realize, you're going through four layers of fabric when sewing the two raw edges together. But it should be easy since the fabric is really thin. And a beading needle is also very pointy.





















Step 5. Now go right back down that same running stitch so the the thread is now coming out of the bottom center of the flower.

Tomorrow I'll show you how to tack it onto a block and the endless possibilities of these cute little flower. Or big ones. Depending on what you want to accomplish.