DIY Stretchy Watchband {easy tutorial}

So… beaders, jewelry makers, and leather workers all make their own watchbands. Cute watch faces are easily available. Why can’t sewists make their own watchbands? There’s no reason at all!

This watchband is sewn with soft and stretchy cotton/lycra blend jersey. It doesn’t have any clasp or snap, you just wrap it around your wrist twice. That gives you lots of variety for how you want it to wrap, as in the main picture above. And it’s really easy to sew. 🙂

I bought my watch faces from goodybeads.com. Wherever you get yours, make sure you pick one with the little slot for a watch band at the top and the bottom. Not the kind that you attach wires or a chain onto. The openings on these are .75” x .25”

Start by cutting a strip of knit fabric 5” tall by about 20” long. The direction of stretch must be in the length.

As you can see, I didn’t trim off the end of this piece. That’s because I’m going to cut it down to actual size after I try it on.

Slide the watch onto the strip of fabric. Wrap the ends around your wrist and over to the top again. Pin the fabric together at a place that is snug enough to make the watch stay put, but still comfortable to you.

Take the watch off and use tailor’s chalk to mark the place where you pinned on both sides.

Cut the ends off the strip about 1/4” past your markings.

Put the watch back on the strip.

Place the ends together (pin if you need to) and sew with a 1/4” seam allowance. Use a stretch stitch (if your machine has one) or a narrow zig zag.

Unless your fabric has an obvious right side/wrong side, don’t worry about that. If you use a nice solid fabric like I did, it won’t matter. 

In order to make the seam fall on the underside of your wrist, place the watch face only about 1/4 of the way around the band.

Put it on and stop using your cell phone to tell time!

Happy Sewing!