Making Pet Ears – my skill transformation and Top Tips

I have been making pet ears for… about 3 years now? 

And the other day I found one of my first ever pairs of ears!! 

…that weren’t immediately trashed…

And I wanted to share with you my progression over the years and the Top 3 alterations that I think have made the biggest difference to the quality of my pet ears.

Making Pet Ears in 2019 

This pair of ears is one of the first sets I ever made. They were for a high protocol evening back in the day when we could actually host large events 

Ahh the good old days.

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Making Pet Ears in 2022

This is a set that I just completed for a memeber of my local community – they roleplays as a racoon!

This is also the first set of ears I have made for a commission which is very exciting!! 

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Top Tips!

So what has made the biggest difference for me in making pet ears?

• Quality fur

• Craft knives

• Headbands

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Quality Fur

When making my first set of ears I was a student – so I didn’t exactly have a ton of extra cash lying around

I decided to cut corners and just buy the cheapest fur in the colours that I needed

A big mistake

Cheap faux fur has a really intense shine, it clumps and matts in seconds, it sheds when you brush it and the placement of fur leaves bald patches if you try to trim it in any way.

It is near impossible to get a decent product from it. 

If you are budget girl like me the rolls of fur trim from your local craft store work wonderfully for ears

What I look for in when buying fur

• A (relatively) matt sheen to the fur
• Soft and fluffy texture
  • When smoothing it down it doesn’t clump together
• A decent length to it so that I can have a nice inner ear fluff
  • I tend to go for longer than I think I need for my finished product because you can always trim fur away but you can’t add length
• I pull back the fur to see if I can see the backing from the fur side
  • This tells me whether or not I will get bald spots when I trim the fur. 

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Craft knives

When cutting out your ears from the fur

Do 

Not 

Use

Scissors

It cuts off all your fur in big chunks at the base of your pattern and there is no way to fix it 

It is heartbreaking

Using a craft knife cut out your pattern from the back side of the fur

Go slow and gentle so you are only cutting the backing of the fur not the fur itself

It takes time but this method will give you the cleanest edges to your pattern that – if you want- you can trim away later. 

I like to leave it untrimmed at the back so your ears blend out into your hair

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Headbands!

This one took me a while to learn. 

Using plastic toothed headbands makes it so hard to attach your ears and have them spaced evenly. 

For my first set of ears I had to wear the headband crooked so the ears looked straight

It was so uncomfortable

Smooth wire headbands allow you to attach your ears and move them up and down

This is important for different head shapes

Each person needs their ears in slightly different places to visually fit on their head. 

It also means you can alter your ears to fit the mood of your pet

• up high if you are feeling energetic
• one up/one down if your feeling silly
• down if your tired

I like silver headbands because I like to dye my hair and the silver reflects my hair color, giving me a lot of flexibility.

Whereas I find gold works best for blonde hair and black headbands work best for dark hair.

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For the ear makers out there

I’d love to hear what advice or recommendations you have!

– Mochi-