Creating the Best Fabric Covered Pumpkins
The Fall season is a time of year when crafters are exploding with DIY projects, especially when it comes to craft pumpkins!
So why not add my adorable fabric covered pumpkins to your crafting to-do list?

This is a fun fall craft making fabric-covered pumpkins that are perfect for your Fall and Halloween displays. The great thing about making these kinds of DIY fabric pumpkins is that you can match the fabric to the different seasons and have fun with them! They are easy to make and don’t require any needles, thread, or even a sewing machine.
These are no sew easy pumpkins that you can make in an afternoon. The fun part about them is that you can make them from different colors and patterns by using different fabrics, enabling you to mix and match your displays.

Your display would look more interesting and fuller with one or two larger fabric pumpkins and two smaller pumpkins next to it. These will look awesome for your fall decor, or as Halloween decorations.
Let’s take a look at how to make pumpkins with fabric.
Tips for making Fabric Covered Pumpkins
- Order yourself a variety of polystyrene pumpkin sizes to create an aethetically pleasing display in your home.
- Before you go out and buy fabric, have a look if you have left overs, scraps, or gently used items of clothing that you would like to recycle.
Step-by-Step Instructions for Fabric Covered Pumpkins
I will show you two ways you can make easy fabric pumpkins that are ‘no sew’ (i.e., you do not need a needle and thread for this one).
METHOD 1
The first pumpkin I am going to show you can be created in a matter of minutes.
Tools required for Fabric Covered Pumpkins:
- Carvable styrofoam pumpkins. The Dollar Tree foam pumpkins work great.
- Fabric. Any type of fabric will work, just make sure you are using a white pumpkin if your fabric is very sheer. If you don’t have scrap fabric to use, fat quarters are an inexpensive option.
- Hot glue gun and hot glue
- Sharp knife or exacto knife
- Measuring tape
- Wine corks or other materials for the stems
- Burlap for leaves
- Jute twine for tendrils
Step 1
Take your pumpkin and cut into the top of the foam pumpkin, cutting a hole around the stem (i.e., cut the pumpkin stem right out). The size of the pumpkin doesn’t matter. It’s what you want it to be, and what you can find. Different sizes will add some variety to your display.
Measure the length from the inside of the lip of the hole to the center of the base. Wrap your measuring tape right around the bottom of the pumpkin, and end just inside the lip of the hole on the other side. Once you have that measurement, you know how big your piece of fabric needs to be at a minimum. If you have excess fabric, trim the edges and remove it.

Fold your fabric into quarters. If you’re repurposing a piece of old clothing to wrap your pumpkin, cut off any seams as we don’t want to include these. When cutting your material, cut it a little larger than the required size. If your material is too big, you can just stuff it down into the hole.
Step 3
Lay your piece of cut material wrong side up (right side down) and place your pumpkin upright in the center of the fabric.

Step 4
Bring the material up around the pumpkin and tuck it into the middle.

Step 5
Do this the whole way around to see if you like the result before you start gluing. Check the gatherings of the material and gently pull and manipulate until the desired look is achieved.

Step 6
Untuck all of the fabric and then take your hot glue gun and glue the inside lip of your pumpkin. Remember that hot glue will go through the fabric, and it will burn you, so be careful.
Step 7
Tuck your material into the hole again, and bear in mind that once it is stuck down, you cannot undo it. The glue catches the edges and holds everything tightly in place. If there are bits of material that you want to pull up and tighten up the look of your pumpkin, you can do that and just use your hot glue gun again to secure this in the middle.

Step 8
Get your wine cork (or other stem material) and hot glue it on one end, and then just punch it down into the middle of your pumpkin. Other ideas for stems would include cinnamon sticks or dried branches.

Step 9
It’s time to add your fabric pumpkin leaves and tendrils.
Print the leaf pattern from the file and cut a set out of felt & burlap in the size you want.
Make tendrils by wrapping the twine around the dowel rod, securing both ends with a clothes pin. Get the twine wet by soaking in a sink of about 2” of water for a couple of minutes. Blot off any excess water. Put the dowel rod on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet and bake in the oven on the lowest temperature possible for 15 minutes. Let cool and then unwrap.
METHOD 2
Now I’m going to show you another great way to make decorative fabric-covered pumpkins. This method doesn’t require a single piece of fabric so might work better for the scraps you have.
Supplies for Fabric Covered Pumpkins
- Carvable styrofoam pumpkins. A Dollar Tree pumpkin works great.
- Fabric strips of your choice. Any kind of fabric will work. Check your fabric stash for scraps you can use.
- Two strips of thicker fabric in a coordinating pattern or color for the “leaves”.
- Mod Podge
- Foam brush
- Twine for the stem
- Hot glue gun
- Hot glue
- Sharp scissors
Step 1
The first thing you need to do is cut your chosen piece of material into 1-inch fabric strips. You want to make sure that they are long enough to go from the stem of your pumpkin around the curve to the bottom of your pumpkin. If you have fabric scraps from past projects that work together, then use those.
In this method, we are not going to cut the stem off on this one.
Using your foam brush, apply a generous layer of Mod Podge to your pumpkin. Don’t paint the entire pumpkin in one go, but rather paint from the stem at the center of the pumpkin, and paint it halfway down the pumpkin so that you’re only covering the top of the pumpkin.
Paint the Modge Podge a section of your pumpkin at a time.
Step 2
Take your first strip of fabric and stick it to the pumpkin as close to the stem as you can get it, and then press it down onto the Mod Podge. When you place the following strips of fabric down, make sure that you layer them slightly so the edge overlaps with the previous fabric strip.

Now keep going around your pumpkin, layering, and mod podging as you go. Once your pumpkin is completely covered, lay an additional coat of Mod Podge over the fabric to seal in the strips and prevent frayed edges. again, only paint about halfway down the pumpkin.
Now set it aside and let it dry.

Step 3
When it’s dry, you’re going to do the same thing to the bottom half.
Flip your pumpkin upside down and start mod podging the bottom half. Start painting from right underneath the flaps of fabric to ensure the flapping pieces are truly stuck down.
Keep folding the fabric and layering strips over one another.
Once all strips are secure, Mod Podge the fabric again so there are no frayed edges of the fabric. Leave it to dry.
Step 4
The leaves I used for this one are a little different. Cut two strips of fabric that you want to use. If you would prefer you can do the leaves like method 1 above.

Fan pleat the edge of one of the strips and hold it in your hand. This pleating effect adds an interesting texture to your pumpkin. Take your glue gun with your other hand and place a big blob of glue next to the stem. Carefully glue down the fan pleated edge of your strip.

Do the same thing with the second piece of fabric. Glue it down next to the other one so it looks like they are two leaves at the stem of the pumpkin.
Step 5
The last step is to decorate the stem. Put a circle of hot glue around the stem of the pumpkin – this is where we are going to add the twine for the tendril. Keep repeating this up the stem. Hot glue, wrap the twin, add more hot glue, and wrap more twine.
When you get to the very top, cover the whole tip with hot glue and keep wrapping the twine in circles. Cut the twine and glue the end of it down.

To end off, I like to dovetail the fabric leaves but you can either leave the strips like they are you can.

There you go! Two ways to make cute fabric covered pumpkins for all your decorating needs this season.