It's June, which means wedding season has begun! I love making bridal shower gifts and one of my favorites is this personalized wedding dress wire hanger. Pictured below is the first one that I made a few years ago.
Read on for the tutorial!
MATERIALS
- WOODEN HANGER. I purchased a set of 5 from Bed Bath Beyond. These hangers have grooves for the dress straps and come without a dowel in the middle, which would need to be removed to glue the wire name in place.
- WIRE. 12-14 gauge wire is the best to work with. If the wire's too thin the letters look shaky/crooked; too thick and it's hard to maneuver the wire. Buy a whole roll because you'll need more than you expected! I bought my roll from a nonprofit creative reuse center in Durham.
- ELECTRIC DRILL. Or ask a friend with a drill to help you drill 2 small holes into the hanger
- HAMMER (optional, because my wire was a bit crooked in areas)
- GLUE. I used a hot glue gun
- PLIERS. I used one similar to this needle nose plier
STEP ONE: (unnecessary if you buy brand new wire) I bought recycled wire from The Scrap Exchange and had to hammer it flat first. My husband's glaucoma textbook was the perfect surface to hammer into (it's been sitting on the shelf untouched), much to his dismay. No books were harmed by this blog post.
STEP TWO: Print out the text. You can also freehand if it so inclined! My natural cursive is less than desirable, so I printed the bride and groom name with the LearningCurve font in a size that would fit within the wooden hanger. Leave a few inches of straight wire at the end of the wire, then start bending the letters with the printed text as a guide. To make the heart, make a small "m" shape then twist the base of the heart about 2-3 times.
If you mess up, hammer that part of the wire straight and resume bending. Crossing the "t" is like making a mini 3-leaf clover or a cross.
STEP THREE: Find a drill bit that is a little bit (hah!) smaller than the wire thickness so that it will fit securely into the hole that you end up drilling
STEP FOUR: Drill 2 small holes directly into each side of the hanger, about half an inch. Try not to drill all the way through the hanger!
STEP FIVE: Apply glue to each end of the wire name and insert wire into the holes on either side of the hanger. Let dry and then admire your work! Tie a pretty ribbon at the top of the hanger to make it even lovelier.
Here's the personalized dress hanger that my friend Emily ordered from me, below!
just realized you had a blog from one of your most recent instagram posts! awesome X)
ReplyDeletei also remember that first one you made and thinking, "omg, so legit."