How to sew a plushie from a printed pattern

Nine steps from a stack of printed pages to a finished plush. Nothing here needs a machine; a needle and a ladder stitch will do.

1. Print at 100 percent

Print the pattern with scaling off, on the paper size it was laid out for. Measure the bar on the first page: it must be exactly 100 mm. If it is not, the printer scaled the page and every piece is wrong.

2. Tape the tiles

Each sheet overlaps the next by 10 mm and carries crop marks in the corners. Trim one edge of each tile to its mark, lay it over the neighbour and tape along the join.

3. Cut the paper pieces

Cut each piece on its outer line, which already includes the seam allowance. Keep the label with the piece; it says how many to cut and whether the second copy is mirrored.

4. Lay out with the grain

Fleece and minky stretch more one way than the other. Lay every piece so its grain arrow follows the direction the fabric stretches least, and flip a piece marked mirrored before you cut its second copy.

5. Cut the fabric

Pin or weight each piece and cut around it. Snip a tiny mark at each notch, into the allowance only.

6. Match and pin

Pair up the edges that share a label: an edge mates with exactly one edge of one other piece, and the notches on the two line up. Pin right sides together.

7. Sew, leaving the gap

Sew along the stitch line, which sits inside the cut line by the allowance you chose. Leave the edge marked as the opening unsewn, usually at the back or under the belly.

8. Turn and stuff

Clip curves in the allowance, turn the plush right side out through the gap and stuff it, firmly in the limbs and softer in the body.

9. Close

Fold the allowances of the gap in and close it with a ladder stitch so the seam disappears. Add the eyes and a nose last, on the notches the head pieces carry.