If you missed the first 5 parts of the series, you can find them here:

• Bridgerton House Baby Blanket #1: Introduction
• Bridgerton House Baby Blanket #2: Making the Brick Blanket
• Bridgerton House Baby Blanket #3: Adding the Surface Crochet Vines
• Bridgerton House Baby Blanket #4: Making the Rose Pieces
• Bridgerton House Baby Blanket #5: Making the Wisteria Pieces

Table of Contents

• A Note on Child Safety
• Equipment
• Positioning the Elements
  • The Layout
    • The Wisteria
    • The Roses
• Sewing on the Wisteria Pieces
• Sewing on the Rose Leaves
• Sewing on the Roses
• Final Thoughts

A Note on Child Safety

Obviously, because this is a baby blanket, it’s important to make it as safe as possible for young children. When developing this pattern, child safety was always at the forefront of my mind, so I have used specific techniques for sewing on each of the appliqué elements to make sure everything is attached as securely as possible. Having said this, anything handmade will only be as safe and secure as you make it- if any elements are not sewn on securely, they will pose a serious choking hazard. Additionally, accidents can happen- appliqué elements may become loose after repeated use, or as a result of the wear-and-tear of daily life, so, just to be on the safe side I would not recommend leaving a young child/baby with this blanket unsupervised.

Equipment

To assemble the blanket, you will need the following equipment:

• All of the appliqué elements (i.e. the roses, rose leaves and wisteria pieces from parts #4 and #5).
• Sewing needle (with an eye large enough to fit DK weight yarn).
• Scissors.
• Crochet hook (optional: I used this to help position the elements before I stitched them down, to ensure I was happy with the overall look before attaching anything permanently).

That’s it! If you’ve left long ends on each of the appliqué elements, as instructed in the specific posts (one pink end for each rose piece, one dark green end for each rose leaf and two light green ends for the wisteria pieces), you shouldn’t need any additional yarn at this stage. This means that you will end up with fewer ends to darn in (a major win, if you ask me) and the appliqué elements will be attached more securely.

Positioning the Elements

Before you start sewing, it’s a good idea to lay out all of the elements on the blanket, so you can get an idea of how the finished blanket will look. You can absolutely just lay the elements on top, but I found that all of the loose ends lying on top of the blanket made it difficult to visualise the finished product. This is where the crochet hook comes in! Lay the elements out where you want them, then pull the ends through to the back of the blanket using the crochet hook (the size of the hook doesn’t really matter- use whatever you have to hand). That way, you’ll get a much better idea of how the finished blanket will look.

The Layout

You can attach the appliqué elements in whatever layout you choose, but, if you want to mimic my blanket, here’s a rough overview of how I did it:

The Wisteria

The wisteria pieces are grouped together in clusters of 2 (1 long piece, 1 short piece). You should have 10 long wisteria pieces and 10 small, so you’ll end up with 10 wisteria clusters around the perimeter of the blanket. Start by placing one wisteria cluster in each of the four corners. Then place one wisteria cluster in the centre of each short side. Finally, space 2 wisteria clusters evenly down each long side of the blanket. Like this, you should have ten, equally-spaced wisteria clusters all around the perimeter of the blanket.

When it comes to positioning the individual wisteria pieces, make sure that each wisteria piece sits right on top of (or up against) one of the brown, surface crochet ‘vines’. This is important because that surface crochet is supposed to mimic the wisteria branch, so the wisteria flowers need to look as if they are growing from it! Make sure that the leafy end of the wisteria pieces sits closest to the branch, as pictured. I opted to position all of the clusters so that they were pointing inwards, towards the centre of the blanket, as if they are hanging down from the branch.

The Roses

Each of the spaces between the wisteria clusters is filled with a rose cluster, so you end up with a continuous, alternating pattern all around the perimeter of the blanket: wisteria, rose, wisteria, rose, etc.

For the most part, rose clusters consist of two rose pieces (1 large, 1 small) and one rose leaf piece. The only two exceptions to this are the clusters in the centre of each long side of the blanket: these rose clusters consist of three rose pieces (2 large, 1 small) and two rose leaf pieces. You should end up with 8 x 2-rose clusters and 2 x 3-rose clusters.

Much like how the wisteria pieces should look as if they are growing out of the brown surface crochet ‘vine’, the rose clusters should sit on the green surface crochet ‘vine’, so they look like they are growing from it. The roses can be placed in any orientation, but the leaves should always be positioned so that the round end sits on the green vine, while the pointed end points away from it.

Sewing on the Wisteria Pieces

Each wisteria piece should have two long, green ends left attached for sewing onto the blanket. One end will be at the base of the petals, while the other will be at the top of the petals (i.e. the base of the leaves). The end at the base of the petals will be used to attach the purple part of the wisteria to the blanket, while the other end will be used to secure the leaves. This will add an extra layer of security, while also giving you the freedom to position both the petals and the leaves however you would like.

Let’s start with attaching the petals. Each wisteria piece is sewn on individually, one at a time. I prefer to start with a long wisteria piece and create an organic shape with that, then move onto a shorter piece and ‘nestle’ it alongside the first piece. After both petal pieces are attached, I stitch down both of the leaves. We’ll be using a simple running stitch to stitch the central, green chain that runs through all of the petals to the blanket.

Thread the petal end onto your needle, then insert the needle through the blanket, from front to back, as pictured, where you want the bottom of your wisteria piece to sit.

Bring the needle back up in a slightly different spot, so that it comes through the green starting chain, close to the end.

Bring the needle back down to the other side of the blanket, bringing it back through the green starting chain, a little further along the wisteria piece.

Keep going, weaving the needle up and down through the blanket and the starting chain, until you come to the end of the petals. I prefer to wait until I’ve attached all the elements before weaving in the ends, just in case I want to change any positions, but you can sew them in whenever you want. For the neatest finish, I recommend bringing the end to the front of the work and darning it into the starting chain underneath the petals. This way, the petals will hide it from the front and the back will still look nice and neat.

Once you’ve sewn the first, long wisteria piece on, you can attach the second, shorter wisteria piece. The two pieces should sit snugly alongside each other, to give the illusion of a single, full wisteria bloom. Attach the second wisteria piece in exactly the same manner as the first, using a running stitch that is worked through the central green chain.

At this point, you should have one wisteria cluster with all the petals stitched down. Now, it’s time to attach the leaves. Attaching the leaves will add an extra layer of safety to the blanket and allows you to control how they sit.

I like to stitch the leaves down in a wide ‘v’ shape, so that the top of the wisteria petals sits within the leaves.

Use the same running stitch technique as the petal section for the leaves. When attaching the leaves, I like to run my stitches right down the centre of the leaf piece, so that the leaves on either side can still move and stand up, to make them look more natural.

Start by threading the end (the one from the base of the leaf piece/top of the petals) onto a needle, then pull the needle through to the back of the blanket, where you want the top of the leaf piece to sit.

Bring the needle back up through the blanket, coming up through the centre of the leaf piece, near the top edge.

Bring the needle back down, slightly further along the centre line of the leaf piece to make the next stitch.

Repeat this until you have stitched all the way down the centre of the leaf, stopping just before the end, so that the final little leaf is left free to curl up/move. When sewing in the end, I like to darn it into the leaf piece itself, again, to keep the back of the blanket looking tidy.

Repeat this process for both leaves, then you’ll have your first, completely attached, wisteria cluster! Repeat for all ten of the clusters, aiming to keep the shapes of the petals and leaves as organic and natural-looking as you can.

Sewing on the Rose Leaves

The technique for attaching the rose leaves is exactly the same as for the wisteria leaves. The aim is to run a line of stitching down the very centre of the leaf, leaving the sides and pointed top free to give the leaf some dimension. The long end that we left on the leaf pieces should sit at the base of each leaf (i.e. the rounded end, not the pointy end). We’ll use this to attach the leaves to the blanket.

I like to sew the rose leaves on first, before the roses themselves, so that the roses can overlap the leaf slightly- it just makes everything look a bit more natural.

Start by threading the end onto the needle, then bring it down through the blanket, from front to back, where you want the base of the leaf to sit (i.e. on the green surface crochet ‘vine’).

Come back up through the blanket, from back to front this time, a little bit further down the centre of the leaf, sticking to that centre line. Because of how we crocheted these leaves, it’s pretty easy to see where that centre line is, so use that as your guide.

Then, bring the needle back down through the centre of the leaf and the blanket beneath.

Keep bringing the needle up and down, through the work, until you come to just before the end of the leaf. Leaving the pointed end unattached will help the leaf to look more organic.

Now, you have an attached leaf! As before, I like to leave all the sewing in of ends until I’ve attached everything, but, when you do sew in the ends for the leaves, try to sew them into the leaves themselves, keeping the ends at the back of the leaves, if possible.

Sewing on the Roses

The roses are, unfortunately, the trickiest element to attach to the blanket, but, once you get the hang of it, it shouldn’t take too long to attach each one. Each rose piece should have one, long end for sewing in at the back. The aim is to use this end to work a running stitch all around the base of the rose, in a rough circle. This technique will provide the most strength and security.

Start by threading the end onto your needle, then bring the needle through to the back of the work, anchoring the rose wherever you want it to sit.

Next, bring the needle back up through the work, slightly further around the circumference of the rose, and catch a few stitches from the lower side of the rose as you do this.

Bring the needle back down through to the other side of the blanket, slightly further around the circumference of the rose again, catching a few more stitches from the lower side of the rose as you go.

Work all the way around the rose like this, running the stitches through both the blanket and the rose as you go, until you have stitched a wide circle all around the rose. The wider your circle of stitching, the more secure the rose will be. Don’t go too wide, though, or you’ll be able to see the stitches.

Ta-da! Now you have one attached rose!

Attach any other roses in the cluster in the exact same way, with the circle of stitching. However, when you come to the area where the new rose abuts the old rose, push your needle horizontally through the side of the first rose, as shown (you’re not going through the blanket itself at this stage, just the rose!).

Then do the same thing to the new rose, pushing the needle through horizontally, before continuing on your way around the rose, stitching it to the blanket again.

These two stitches just help to pull the roses together a little bit. This is optional, but will help to make the rose clusters look more organic and less like two separate roses, sitting near each other.

Now you’ll have a perfect little rose cluster! Repeat this process for all of the remaining clusters, then sew in all the ends (once you are happy with your finished blanket, of course!). As with the other elements, I recommend bringing the rose ends through to the front of the work and sewing them into the underside of the roses, for the neatest finish.

Final Thoughts

And… that’s it! Once everything’s sewn on, you’ll have your very own, Bridgerton House Baby Blanket ready to be used!

These instructions may seem a little overwhelming, but once you get into the swing of things, the sewing-up part of the process will go really quickly. Of course, you don’t have to follow my instructions- if you have a preferred method of sewing on embellishments, or just think of a better way to do it, you can absolutely go ahead and do that!

In other news…

Now that this pattern is finally complete, I’ve put it on Ravelry! You can find it here (and you can check out some of my other designs here, if you’re interested!).

I’ve had so much fun designing and developing this pattern for you over the past couple of years- I’m so glad it’s finally yours in its entirety! I hope you love it as much as I do!

Gemma

xxx

HAPPY BRIDGERTON SEASON 3 (PART 1) RELEASE DAY!!!!!!

Phew, now that’s out the way- it’s time to celebrate! Bridgerton Watch Party Week may be over, but, evidently, my thoughts of the show never end. This post is the first in another Bridgerton-inspired series, which will be coming out in weekly instalments (interspersed with other, non-Bridgerton posts, though- so please don’t be put off if Bridgerton isn’t really your thing!). Over the next 5 weeks, I’ll be sharing my new, original (and free!) crochet pattern, inspired by Bridgerton. This is my…

🌸🧱BRIDGERTON HOUSE BABY BLANKET🧱🌸

This pattern has been 2 whole years in the making (yep, you read that right. Can you tell I’m somewhat of a perfectionist?). One of the things I love most about Bridgerton is the aesthetic- the effort and thought that goes into the costuming, the settings and the symbolism just makes my heart so happy. This pattern is a direct consequence of that love- it’s me, letting myself be inspired by something that genuinely brings me joy and creating something I’m truly, truly proud of. I can’t wait to share it with you.

In this post, I’ll be introducing you to the blanket and giving you a little bit of backstory on the design process, as well as a roadmap for how the rollout of this pattern will look. I’ve decided to split the pattern up into several posts, to ensure that I can give all of the elements enough attention and consideration (without overwhelming everyone with an insanely long post). Once all of the parts are out, I’ll release the pattern on Ravelry, so that you can save it/link your own projects to it more easily!

Also: this blanket is actually a super versatile pattern- even if you’re not a die-hard Bridgerton fan like me, you can still use the basic brick blanket pattern as a basis for all manner of projects and baby blankets. The possibilities are endless!

Let’s get into it, shall we?

Table of Contents

• Inspiration
• The Design Process
• Trialling Techniques
  • The Brick Blanket
  • The Flowers
  • The Vines
• Putting It All Together
• Master Material List
• Pattern Release Roadmap

Inspiration

As I’m sure you can tell from the name, this blanket is inspired by Bridgerton House, one of the buildings in the show and, unsurprisingly, the home of the titular family. Its deep, red brick stands out among the other, more neutral, stone buildings of the ‘ton’, and purple wisteria runs along the facade. The front courtyard is surrounded by a wrought iron fence, which is decorated with rose bushes that add little splashes of pink, here and there. The building itself is actually Ranger’s House, in London- though, in real life (sadly), the wisteria and roses are nowhere to be seen.

For the blanket, I opted to include three of the most iconic elements of the house: the red bricks, the purple wisteria and the pink roses. One of the most interesting things about Bridgerton is how it blends the regency and modern eras, so I really wanted the blanket to reflect that dichotomy- to seem ornate and opulent, but also simple and elegant- almost minimal.

The Design Process

I first started dreaming about this blanket when I was struggling through some withdrawal symptoms after finishing Season 2. I have a little book where I jot down little notes or sketches of ideas I have for crochet projects and I drew this (super precise and accurate) sketch in the throes of my Bridgerton-induced fever:

I spent a bit of time muddling around with the general concept- trying out different arrangements, designs and elements that I could try to incorporate, until I had a clearer idea of what I really wanted to achieve with this blanket. I then created a slightly more detailed sketch on Procreate, which is an iPad drawing app:

I ended up with this design, which I think really encompassed everything I had hoped to achieve- the blanket itself is fairly simple and minimal, but the flowers and twisting branches add that sense of over-the-top, floral opulence.

Sketching my design like this also meant that I could easily try out different arrangements of the elements- I wanted the wisteria to be pointing downwards (because, you know, gravity), but I also wanted it to go right around the perimeter of the blanket. By fiddling around with my sketch on Procreate, I could try out different options super easily, until I finally came to this half-and-half design, where the top half of the blanket is always pointing downwards. I did end up deviating from the design ever so slightly, here and there, by adding wisteria leaves and positioning the roses in clusters, but, otherwise, I stayed pretty true to my original idea!

Trialling Techniques

Ah, finally. We come to the bit of this project that took me the longest (most of the 2 years, to be exact). Trialling the techniques to work out the pattern for this blanket- to turn my sketch into a reality!

The Brick Blanket

I decided pretty early on that I would create the brick blanket first, then crochet some wisteria and rose embellishments separately to appliqué onto that blanket. Truthfully, I expected the flowers to be the trickiest part of this, but, no, no- it was the bricks!

I started by deciding on what stitch to use for the bricks. I wanted something that had a little bit of texture (because bricks are not perfectly smooth), but also something that looked professional and neat. After a lot of sampling, I settled on using linen stitch (sometimes called moss stitch), which produces a lovely texture and feel- it’s soft, squishy and looks really neat. It’s also super easy to work up, so you can really get into a mindless, crochet rhythm (my favourite thing).

Initially, I had planned to make the bricks separately and crochet them together with a darker yarn (acting as the ‘mortar’) but, ultimately, I just wasn’t happy with the end result. I desperately wanted to leave the edges of the blanket as they were, without a border, for a more minimal, modern vibe, but the edges weren’t smooth enough for that. I tried so many things to get around this, but it just wasn’t working for me, so I had to go back to the drawing board. Eventually, I worked out a way, using colourwork techniques, to make the whole blanket in one piece, bricks and mortar together, which gave perfectly straight, neat sides. It was so perfect (and so much easier), I almost couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought of it in the first place! Not only does this method make for much neater edges, it also drastically reduces the amount of sewing required for this blanket (which is a huge win, by my standards!).

The Flowers

As I mentioned, I was pretty sure that developing the patterns for the flowers would be a tricky undertaking. Truthfully, it was a challenge, but, after the whole brick saga, it honestly felt pretty straightforward! After (quite a lot) of samples and lots of trialling different hook sizes and petal numbers and colour combinations, I ended up with two different sizes of both the wisteria fronds and the roses. Admittedly, the wisteria isn’t anywhere near anatomically correct (my apologies to all of the botanists and wisteria-worshippers out there), but I think it still gives a pretty good impression of it!

I did also want to include some greenery here and there, so I moved on to trying to create some leaves for each of my flowers. Again, this took a bit of trial and error- the rose leaves were pretty straight forward, but the wisteria leaves took a bit more work. In the end, I worked out a way to crochet the whole wisteria flower, leaves and all, as one piece, which makes sewing the blanket together that little bit easier (a big win)! The rose leaves, on the other hand, did have to be made separately, but I suppose you can’t win them all.

The Vines

Another thing I had to figure out was how to make the vines (is it accurate to call these vines? Or is that just for grapes? Gah- my plant knowledge is severely lacking)- I wanted to include both the woody, twisty, branches of the wisteria plants and the green stems of the roses weaving all around the perimeter of the blanket . After some research (and more testing), I opted to use a technique called surface crochet for this. This is a great technique that produces a similar result to the embroidery technique ‘chain stitch’, but you can use yarn straight from the ball, instead of having to cut a certain length (and recut, when you inevitably either run out or get into a major tangle).

To add even more dimension, I opted to crochet into the surface crochet for my wisteria branches. This allowed me to make the branches thicker, providing some differentiation between the two ‘vines’, and to add some texture to the branches, to make them a little bit more realistic (though I do, of course, use that term very loosely).

Putting It All Together

After months of testing, trialling and researching, I was finally ready to make my blanket. It came out… perfectly. As in, I was kind of amazed at how similar it looks to my design- I’m SO proud of it! Usually with crafting, you’ll have an idea in your head of how something will look and it will turn out completely different- not bad, just different. This blanket looks exactly like the design I had in my head and I’m still kind of baffled by that. Honestly though, for 2 years of work, it probably should, so I won’t complain.

All in all, the final blanket measures approximately 90cm x 65cm. I designed it as a baby blanket, but you could use it as a lap blanket, or perhaps even a wall hanging (if that’s your vibe), instead.

Master Material List

While I will include a list of everything you need to make each stage of the Bridgerton House Blanket in their individual posts, I wanted to include a master post of materials and notions here as well.

To make this blanket, you will need:

• 4x100g balls Stylecraft Highland Heathers DK in the shade Marmalade.
• 1x100g ball of Stylecraft Special DK in the shade Walnut.
• Small amounts of Stylecraft Special DK in the shades: Khaki, Mocha, Pale Rose, Parma Violet, Pistachio, Powder Pink, Raspberry and Wisteria.*
• Crochet hooks (2.0mm, 2.5mm, 3.0mm, 3.5mm, 4.0mm, 5.0mm).**
• 5x yarn bobbins.
• Darning needle.
• Scissors.

For this blanket, I’ve used Stylecraft yarn. Stylecraft is always my (acrylic) yarn of choice- it’s so soft and easy to work with, plus it comes in a great range of colours! You can use a different DK weight yarn, if you prefer, though, for all of the embellishments. I would recommend using the Stylecraft Highland Heathers (specifically in the shade Marmalade) for the main blanket though, because it is the perfect brick-red shade and quite a unique yarn!

* In the interest of being as informative as possible, I did actually work out exactly how much of each of each colour you’ll need for this project, so you can work out if any scraps you may have lying around are large enough. If you are a little under the listed quantities, I would recommend seeing how far you can get with what you have, before buying another ball. Because each element is so small, you don’t need to worry about dye lots/changing colours, so you can always buy more yarn later on, if needed!

** I can only apologise for the ridiculous number of different hook sizes- a number of the elements require multiple different sizes in order to come together properly, so it just kind of happened. I have this set of crochet hooks, which includes every hook size needed for this project. The hooks themselves are really good quality (and ergonomic!), so it’s a great option for this project (or just, you know, in general).

Pattern Release Roadmap

Finally, then, after 2 whole years, this pattern is ready to be shared! As I mentioned, I’ll be releasing it in weekly instalments. I’ll be coming back to this ‘master post’ as each instalments is released, to link in the new posts and make it super easy for you to find all of the sections). Without further ado, though, here’s the roadmap (along with some little sneak peaks of what each post will encompass), so that you can stay in the loop:

• Week 1: Making the Brick Blanket

Linen stitch, main blanket pattern & colourwork using yarn bobbins.

• Week 2: Using Surface Crochet to Add the Vines

Surface crochet, working into surface crochet & interlacing surface crochet paths.

• Week 3: Making the Rose Pieces

Making large and small roses, working with a fine hook & making rose leaves.

• Week 4: Making the Wisteria Pieces

Crocheting a spiral of petals around a central chain & making attached leaves.

• Week 5: Assembly

Positioning, sewing on the elements & child safety tips.

And that’s it! As I mentioned, once all 5 instalments have been released, I will be creating a pattern page for this project on Ravelry, so that you can save it for later, or link your own projects to it.

UPDATE: 

This pattern is now on Ravelry! You can find it here.

I hope you’re as excited as I am for the next 5 weeks- I’ll see you back here soon!

Gemma

xxx

I am a big fan of Bridgerton. It’s unsurprising really, given that I was practically raised on Jane Austen and that I like my fictional entertainment to be at least 90% romance. Nonetheless, Bridgerton just speaks to me on a spiritual level- I mean, Julie Andrews as a narrator? Yes, please. Orchestral covers of pop songs? I have a whole playlist of them. Regency fashion with a modern spin? Ooohhh, my heart. One of my favourite things about the series, though, is just the general aesthetic: the wisteria everywhere, the flowers, the stately homes- it is all just so pretty, and so springtime. With the release of the spinoff series Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story set for 4th May, it felt like the perfect time to finally attempt a Bridgerton themed set up in my bullet journal.

One note before we get into it: I was very inspired by Journal Away on YouTube- particularly her May 2022 setup, which also had a regency-inspired theme. I’ll be sure to highlight the particular features of that setup that I drew inspiration from as I go through mine!

Equipment used:

For the setup:

• Parchment coloured paper
• White card
• Muji 0.38 pen, black
• Crayola supertips, pink (light, mid, dark), purple, green (lime, sage, bottle) and brown (from this pastel pack and this 24-pack).
• Tombow dual brush pen, N15 (black), N89 (warm grey), 990 (light sand), 623 (purple sage) and 553 (mist purple). (I got N15 and N89 together, in this pack).
• Uniball signo broad, gold
• Scissors and glue
• Craft knife and cutting board
• Pencil, ruler and eraser

For the Bridgerton House drawing:

• Printer & printer paper
• Tracing paper
• Tape (masking and cellotape)
• Coloured pencils
• Pencil, ruler and eraser
• Sketchbook paper
• Phone/scanning device

Before we get into the page-by-page walkthrough of the setup, let’s talk about a few of the individual elements. This setup looks complicated, but, at its core, it’s really just a series of pretty straightforward elements combined together in different ways. Once you know how to achieve the three main components: the handwritten paper, the wisteria and the roses, it’s just a case of incorporating those elements into basic layouts. Ultimately, you get the extravagance and detail (dare I say, fussiness?) that you want from a Regency-inspired setup, without needing to spend hours and hours on it. 

A small caveat to this: while the setup itself didn’t take long, drawing the house for the cover page definitely did. I’ll go through how I created this drawing later on, but if you’re looking for something a bit quicker and easier, you might want to consider using a printed-out image instead!

Anyway, let’s go through each of the main elements. I’ll show you how to create each one, and, once you’ve got them in your arsenal, the setup will feel much more approachable.

Handwritten paper:

The plot of Bridgerton revolves around a mysterious, Gossip Girl-style author named Lady Whistledown, who publishes pamphlets of scandalous gossip about the members of high society. As a result, the written word is a key theme throughout the series- characters write to each other, Lady Whistledown writes her pamphlets and there are quills and ink pots on every desk. I wanted to convey that aspect of the series in my journal, so I included this ‘handwritten paper’ as a decorative element. You can buy both paper and washi tape that come with cursive writing already on printed on them, but I had this parchment-coloured paper already, so I decided to just make my own. I actually watched Journal Away do this in their May setup (albeit on much thinner/more translucent paper), so I felt pretty confident that it would work out. I just used my Muji 0.38 pen to fill an entire page of the parchment-coloured paper with writing, written quickly in cursive (it doesn’t even need to be particularly legible). I actually just wrote out the lyrics to Taylor Swift’s Wildest Dreams (a fun little Easter egg, given that an instrumental version of this song is used in the first season of the show). Once you’ve filled the paper, you can tear it up and use it to decorate your spreads however you would like.

Wisteria doodles:

I feel like wisteria and Bridgerton have become pretty synonymous since the show’s release in 2020. In Bridgerton‘s London, there seems to be wisteria everywhere, including, as I mentioned earlier, on the iconic Bridgerton House. As a result, I just had to include lots of wisteria in this setup. I got pretty good at drawing these wisteria doodles- they’re super quick and easy, and it really doesn’t matter if you’re messy! I’ve made a little step-by-step guide to show you how I drew them, which you can see below:

I used two types of pen for these doodles: Crayola Supertips (green, brown and dark purple) and Tombow dual brush pens (N89 warm grey and 623 purple sage), but you can use whichever pens you have to hand.

Rose doodles:

Roses are another flower that features prominently throughout the series- multi-toned pink ones even climb up the gates in front of Bridgerton House. I tried to mimic those specific roses in my setup- again, I’ve made a little step-by-step guide:

For the roses I only used Crayola Supertips: you’ll need 3 shades of pink and 2 shades of green.

Right then, now that we’ve covered the three main elements, let’s get into a page-by-page rundown of the setup.

Cover Page:

Bridgerton House is one of the most iconic and recognisable elements of the show, with its red brick walls and wisteria. I really wanted the house to feature on my cover page, but I also wanted it to match in with the aesthetic- that is, I didn’t want to print out an image and stick it in (though you absolutely could do this to save yourself some time). I opted instead to produce a pencil crayon drawing of the house, which I could then scan, scale and print out on thinner paper to stick right into my journal. It was a bit of a… process, but I’m really happy with how it turned out in the end.

Full disclosure, I absolutely did trace the outlines of the house for my drawing (know your limits, people). To do that, I printed out a mirror-image of the house (it has to be flipped, otherwise your finished drawing will be flipped!) and stuck it to a flat surface using masking tape. I then stuck a sheet of tracing paper over the top (using cellotape this time, because the masking tape didn’t stick very well to the tracing paper). I then used a ruler and pencil to draw over all of the lines, leaving gaps for the foliage. When I was finished, I untaped everything, then stuck a fresh piece of sketchbook paper on the board, followed by the tracing paper (reversed, so that my pencil marks were touching the paper underneath) on top. I then went over all the lines in pencil, which transferred the original pencil from the other side of the tracing paper onto the sketchbook paper. When that was done, I was left with a pencil outline of the house on the sketchbook paper, ready to be used. Once I had my pencil outline, I went over all the lines with my Muji 0.38 pen, using a ruler to get crisp, straight lines. After that, I got to colouring.

When I was happy with my drawing, I scanned it into my computer, so that I could resize it to fit my journal perfectly (the house is so detailed that it was much more achievable to draw a bigger version and make it smaller than draw a small version from the start). I printed the resized version on standard printer paper, trimmed around the outline and then cut it in half down the centre, so I could stick one half on each side of the journal.

With the house done, the rest of the spread was pretty straightforward. I tore up some of my decorative handwriting paper to put on the top two corners, stuck the house in and decorated the top of the spread with wisteria doodles and the bottom with roses. For the May header, I used my Tombow N15.

Monthly Calendar:

My calendar this month utilises a very simple layout- it’s essentially a grid without any defining vertical lines. I used my Tombow 553 (the closest I could find in my stash to Bridgerton blue!) to create the horizontal lines, then wrote the dates in the top left corner of each ‘box’ with my Muji 0.38 pen.

I wanted to incorporate some sort of archway into this setup and I thought it would be perfect for this calendar spread. I sketched out a basic shape in pencil first, then doodled the wisteria along the top and the roses climbing up the columns. After that, I went over my sketch with my Muji 0.38 pen, then coloured in the archway itself with my Tombow 990. I think, if I were to do this spread again, I would use my Tombow N89 instead of this light sand colour, just because I feel that the tone of the pen clashes a bit with the colour of the decorative parchment paper I used throughout the setup.

For the header on this page I used another torn piece of my decorative paper, which I layered underneath a white card rectangle with inverted rounded corners. I typically prefer to use thinner paper in my journal, to prevent it from becoming too bulky, but the card was necessary here to ensure that the decorative paper did not show through. I drew a slightly inset border on the card, following the shape, with my Muji 0.38 pen and wrote the header ‘May’ in cursive.

May Reset and Daily Sunshine:

I have been feeling a little all over the place recently, so I decided to dedicate a page in this month’s setup to getting myself back together a little bit. I’ve called it my ‘May Reset’ and the aim is to use it as a place for notes/plans for getting back on track. I decorated this page with wisteria, which I placed along the left-hand side and the top of the page.

The Daily Sunshine spread is also new to my bullet journal this month (since I started blogging, at least). At the start of this year, I decided to cut down on the number of spreads that I included in each monthly setup to make both creating and using my bullet journal seem more approachable. For the most part, this has worked, but I have found myself particularly missing this spread. It works very much like a gratitude log or positive memory list- everyday I write down one good thing that happened, whether that is something that I am grateful for, or just something that made me happy: a little bit of sunshine every day. I find that I tend to focus on the negative things that happen, so it is nice to finish every day by forcing myself to remember something good instead! To decorate this page, I continued the wisteria from the previous page on along the top, and added some roses along the bottom and right-hand side of the page. I used more decorative paper and another card header for the title. The frame around the lines for writing out my daily sunshine lines was another element inspired by Journal Away’s May setup– I think the decorative corners really add a sense of extravagance that feels very regency. I filled mine in with my gold Uniball to add even more fanciness. I used my Tombow 553 to highlight the vertical space for the dates, and my N89 to highlight every other line, just to add a bit of definition.

While the Daily Sunshine page is mainly decorated with roses and the May Reset page is only decorated with wisteria, you see both of these elements together when you look at the double-page spread as a whole. I think this works really well, because it gives a sense of distinction between the two separate spreads, but also brings the whole double-page spread in line with the rest of theme.

Projects:

Last month, I tried out a new spread in my journal for keeping track of my projects. Within it, I had a kanban board, a space to list out projects and a space for notes (you can read more about this spread here). I found that spread really useful, so I have included one in my May setup as well. However, I have slightly adapted it to make it more functional: I’ve changed up the stages in my kanban board, I’ve included a section for my blog post schedule and I’ve also added a section for commissions (I have a couple of projects for friends/family to do in May). I’m hoping these changes will make the spread even more useful for me. As with my other spreads in this setup, these pages are decorated with the decorative paper, roses, wisteria, my ‘Bridgerton blue’ Tombow for headers and the decorative frames, inspired by Journal Away. The only new element here is that for the bullet points I opted to use little gold diamonds, as an ode to the phrase ‘Diamond of the Season’, which is used frequently throughout the series.

Weeklies:

Now we’re onto my weekly setups for May. As always, I like to use tabs to separate my weeklies and this month I chose to make my tabs rectangular with inverted rounded corners (much like the header frames used throughout the setup). Instead of covering them with coloured paper, as I usually do, I just used the pink and purple pens I used to draw the wisteria and rose doodles throughout the setup to colour each one, then added an inset border using my Muji 03.8 pen. As a backdrop for the tabs, I used more of my decorative paper.

I tried to keep my weeklies pretty consistent, so the only thing that changes really over all of the five is the layout of the boxes. Otherwise, each weekly has wisteria along the top (growing from ‘planter boxes’ the bottom left on the first weekly spread and the bottom right on my review page), daily task lists with ‘Bridgerton blue’ header bands and notes/task lists with the gold-cornered frames and rose doodles.

For my first weekly, I opted for a vertical layout for my daily task lists.

For the second weekly, I divided each page into 6, then used 7 sections for my daily task lists, 1 for my notes, 2 for my task box and the final 2 sections at the bottom for the title.

For the third weekly, I divided the page in half horizontally and used half-height vertical boxes for my daily task lists.

For the fourth weekly, I used horizontal boxes (which are still, admittedly, not my favourite for daily task lists, but I like to vary my layouts, and there are only so many different arrangements!).

For the final weekly, I divided the left-hand page into quarters and used 3 of them for the final 3 days of May. I then used the left-hand side of the right-hand page for the first 4 days of June.

May Review:

Finally, we come to my May Review, which follows the same formula as my other review pages. On the left-hand page, I have spaces for my monthly favourites, my #1 memory of the month and the ATP/WTA top 10. For these, I alternated between the decorative frames and the simple ‘Bridgerton blue’ headers. On the right-hand page, I have my title and a space for a polaroid. The wisteria from across the tops of all the weekly pages ends in another planter box in the bottom right-hand corner and I also included some rose doodles that climb across the setup.

I hope you enjoyed reading about my Bridgerton-inspired bullet journal setup. If you’re a Bridgerton fan, I’d love to hear your thoughts on the upcoming season/the Queen Charlotte spinoff in the comments!

Gemma

xxx