1-1/8″ Wooden Button Molds

Made in the USA

Button molds were used to make both cloth and thread (passementerie) covered buttons such as those seen in the work of John Singleton Copley at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. The drill bits used to make these had a guide in the center which left a hole. The center hole is necessary when making “death head” and “basket weave” thread covered buttons. Directions to make “death head” buttons are in “Death Head” buttons their use and construction. When we make death head buttons we use silk quilter’s thread. Sometimes death head buttons were worn on the clothing of the lower sort for example in The Virginia Gazette in 1774, “RUN away . . .  a Scotchman . . .  He had on . . .  a Newmarket coat of light bath coating, not bound, but stitched on the edges, with death head buttons on it”.