This plush baby giraffe wall decor will steal your heart. That sweet face, those tiny giraffe horns, all that irresistible plush softness. Perfect for a jungle kids room or a safari themed nursery!
You can easily make this 3D giraffe art over a weekend with the FREE patterns and instructions in the post below. So grab some cardboard, find your hot glue gun, and get some plush fake fur. Make an adorable little giraffe for someone you love.
This cute giraffe wall art is also educational. It’s designed to look like an oversized alphabet card. You can make a set of giant animal alphabet wall art by combining it with this cute plush llama wall decor.
Keep reading for free patterns and complete instructions.
gather these supplies for making the plush giraffe
- giraffe print fabric or fake fur (a little less than 1 yard) The giraffe fake fur in this post is from JoAnn
- felt or fleece fabric (black for hooves, cream for ear insides, tan for nose)
- contrasting fake fur for mane (a small 4 inch wide strip)
- cotton batting (optional, but nice for adding extra softness and dimension)
- scissors
- double sided tape
- cardboard or foam board
- small section of poster board, or an index card
- X-acto knife or craft knife
- hot glue gun and glue sticks
- button for eye (or use felt)
- two brown pompoms for tops of horns
for the frame & letters you will also need:
- 24 x 36 birch wood panel to use as a background frame (or use a board from a home improvement store)
- alphabet stencils or Citrasolv for transferring letters
- epoxy adhesive like Gorilla Clear Epoxy or JB Weld Clear Epoxy for attaching the giraffe to wood panel frame
step 1: download the FREE baby giraffe pattern
Download the free baby giraffe pattern file HERE and print on normal copy paper. The pattern pieces will print on 9 separate pages. Arrange as shown below.
Use scissors to cut out, and then tape pieces together. Set aside the ear pattern to use later.
step 2: begin creating your baby giraffe wall decor
Place the pattern on a sheet of cardboard or foam board and use a pencil to trace around. Then use a craft knife or X-acto knife to cut out. It should look like this–
Next, cut felt or fleece shapes to cover the nose and bottom of the legs. Use a tan color for the nose, and black for the hooves.
Use a little double stick tape to hold the pieces in place on the cardboard front. Then flip the giraffe over to the back side and wrap the cut edges of the felt/fleece around the cardboard. Use hot glue to secure to the back.
You can cut notches in the fabric so that it will wrap more easily around the tips of the feet.
Flip the giraffe over to the front again. To give your baby giraffe some added softness, cut several layers of cotton batting, the same size as the cardboard pattern, omitting the feet and nose areas. Stack them on top.
Next cut a small section of giraffe print fake fur and use it to cover the back leg as shown below. It’s easier to cover this one leg separately, and then cover the rest of the giraffe in the next step.
Now place the giraffe body on top of your fake fur fabric, and cut out a piece of the giraffe print large enough to cover the batting and remaining parts of the cardboard shape. Leave enough extra margin to be able to wrap over and around the thickness of the cotton batting.
Place the fur on top with batting in middle and cardboard underneath.
Then, fold fabric around cardboard edges, making notches or slits in the fabric to ease it around curves and angles. Use hot glue to glue fabric edges to the cardboard back.
When you flip back over to the front it should look like this–
to make the mane and eye
To make the mane, hot glue a strip of contrasting fake fur to the long neck, along the side.
Then add a button eye. Because the button can be a choking hazard, sew it on with needle and thread if possible, rather than using hot glue.
to make the horns
Cut two small sections from cardboard to make the little giraffe horns. One cardboard strip should be longer than the other. Also cut two sections from tan fleece or felt large enough to wrap around these two strips.
Use hot glue to attach a pompom to the top of each cardboard strip.
Then wrap felt or fleece around the cardboard strip so that it covers the cardboard as well as the lower part of the pompom. Use hot glue to secure the felt/fleece cut edges on the back of the cardboard strip.
Now attach the horns to the top of the baby giraffe head. Glue the shorter horn to the top of the head on the front of the giraffe. Then glue the second longer horn to the cardboard back so that it can be seen behind the first one, at the same height.
to make the ears
Using the ear pattern as a guide, cut two oval shapes from heavy paper (such as a scrap of poster board, an index card, or an old greeting card). Place the paper ovals on the giraffe print fake fur and cut out two slightly larger fabric oval shapes.
Then cut two additional oval shapes from felt or fleece, the same size as the oval ear pattern.
Fold the giraffe fur fabric over the edges of the paper oval and use hot glue to attach it to the paper. You can make notches or cuts in the fabric to make it easier to fold down the fabric on the narrow ends.
Use the felt or fleece ovals to cover the rough edges of the fur, and to create the center of the giraffe ear.
Hot glue the ears to the baby giraffe head.
to make the tail
Cut a small strip of cardboard and use hot glue to attach a little contrasting fake fur to the tip. Then wrap with the cardboard strip with fake fur and use more hot glue to hold in place.
Your little giraffe tail will look like this–
Glue the tail to the back of your giraffe, and your little giraffe is done!
If you like, add a frame and some lettering to turn the plush baby giraffe decor into safari animal alphabet wall art–
For the frame, you will need a birch wood panel in a 24 x 36 size. I used an Ampersand birch painting panel with a 1.5 inch depth for a gallery look. You can also make your own display board by using a piece of 1/2 inch MDF board or birch plywood from a home improvement store.
To attach the plush giraffe to the surface of the board, it’s helpful to use epoxy glue to attach a couple of strips of wood to the back (such as paint stir sticks) and then apply more epoxy glue to those strips to adhere to the wood panel (see below). This works better than trying to hot glue the fur on the back of the giraffe (which will be uneven in places) to your frame, and it’s a more secure attachment method.
Keep reading below to learn how to do the lettering.
for the letters
To make the large G in the upper left corner and the word “giraffe” at the bottom, you can freehand draw the letters, use stencils, or use another option such as CitraSolv to transfer the text to your frame.
If you want to try the CitraSolv method, you will need to print these free giraffe letter patterns on normal copy paper using a toner-based, laser printer. (Inkjet printers will not work for this as the method requires pigment from toner to transfer—if you do not have a laser printer, you can have the letter patterns printed at an office supply store like Staples or Office Depot on a laser printer.) The text will print in reverse order, but when transferred to your frame, everything will be in the correct sequence.
Here is how to use CitraSolv to transfer the text–
Wear gloves. Dampen a cotton ball or tip of a clean rag with CitraSolv. Rub over the paper. The letters will begin to appear as the CitraSolv is absorbed into the paper.
Use the rounded handle of a spoon or other rounded metal utensil to rub over the letters. Rub over the paper firmly in order to press the pigment from the toner onto the board.
When you pull away the paper, your letters will be light, but they will provide enough of a guide that you can paint over them in a color that matches your decor.
step 3: display your baby giraffe safari wall decor
If you use a birch wood painting panel, the recessed back of the frame will fit easily over a couple of nails in the wall for fast and easy hanging. If you use a board from the home improvement store, you will need to add two D rings to the back for hanging.
So adorable!
Enjoy making this little giraffe 3D wall decor for your favorite little adventurer.
artUcreate is an Etsy, Michael’s, and Amazon Associates LLC affiliate.
