Easy Sew Cushions Tutorial

Sewing new cushions may not be as difficult as you think. Here are a few tips and shortcuts to make it as quick and easy as possible.

We have a wonderful porch on our 100 year old house that needed vintage wicker. Once I found the right vintage wicker furniture I set to work on the cushions. Here is a step by step tutorial on how I made these easy sew cushions.

As much as we love the porch on our old house, it does have a main issue. The previous owner glued down indoor/outdoor carpet on it. With other projects in the works, the front porch carpet just isn’t on the list of things to tackle this spring, so for now the carpet must stay. We do eventually fix the carpet issue on the porch, (you can see that fix HERE) but in the mean time, I try to ignore the carpeting and use an indoor outdoor rug to distract from it. HERE is a great resource I like to order outdoor rugs from.

The vintage wicker furniture I found thrifting, is Lloyd Loom brand and wonderful quality. But…

the original cushions were long gone and the newer ones that came with the set the wicker furniture, just weren’t quite right.

They obviously didn’t fit the vintage wicker pieces very well at all. I found they don’t really make cushions ready-made for this size and shape furniture any longer.

In fact, I ran into another gal at one of the stores looking for the right sized cushions for her furniture too, without success. We started to chat, and I realized I was going to need to custom make some to fit properly, and encouraged her to do the same, but she didn’t sew and knew how much it’d cost to hire someone to do it. So, I’m actually hoping that this post will encourage someone too realize it’s not that difficult to sew them! Read on…

So here we go, with a lot of pictures, and fewer words…

HERE is where I shop for ourdoor fabric and sewing supplies.

I removed the cushions that came with the vintage wicker, and since they are in excellent, new condition, I sold them on marketplace.

To make a pattern for the cushions, I actually used some old cheap Christmas wrapping paper. You can use newspaper for this, but actually I have found that it can be a bit messy with the ink, so cheapo wrapping paper is perfect.

After pushing it into the chair seam, I marked the cutting line with a pencil.

After the paper pattern is cut out, I fit it in the chair one more time, just to be sure it fits well.

I chose 2″ foam for the cushions on this vintage wicker . Foam can be cut with an electric knife, which is an especially helpful tip if you’re cutting 4″ thick foam to get a good straight edge, but for 2″ foam, I just snipped it with regular scissors and it turned out fine.

Then onto the fabric…

I just laid the paper pattern out on the back side of a single layer of the fabric, making sure the print of the fabric was going the correct way, front to back, and lightly traced around it with a pencil. (chalk works better if you have some handy)

Because the foam is 2″ thick, I made my cut line on the fabric 2″ wider than the paper pattern. This will give me a generous 1″ seam allowance.

When cutting the 2nd piece of the cushion fabric, (you’ll need a top and bottom piece) I recommend laying the 1st piece you just cut out, right on top on the fabric and using that as your guide.

Be sure you place it with the right sides together, and again check that the pattern is going in the right direction.

Pin the top and bottom of the cushion fabric right sides together. I always use two pins together marking where I am supposed to start and stop, or inevitably I will be sewing along, and go way past the stopping point. If that does happen, it’s no big deal, you just need to rip out some stitches to make the opening large enough. So for these cushions, I left most of the back of the cushion open to get the foam inserted in after the cover is turned right side out.

Once the 2 sides of the cushion cover was done, I turned it right side out. Then, where the opening was in the fabric for the foam to slip in, I folded the raw edges in, pinning it closed.

Now at this point, I knew I was going to have a pillow on the back of the chair that would cover the seam on the back, but if the seam would have been exposed, then I would have hand stitched this pinned back so that the seam would lay flat and not show… but I was in a hurry and these would be hidden, so I put on the zipper foot attachment of my sewing machine, placed the needle all the way to the left and just held the stuffed cushion up to the sewing machine and quickly stitched it shut. This method is super fast, but it does leave a bit of a flange seam. Another option is to insert velcro, ties or even a zipper. Those are a little more involved, but not too bad, just more time.

The new fabric works great with the bold color of the rug.

The chair cushions fit well now.

I love the vintage style of the fabric too, it really does look to me like it could have been from the 20’s or 30’s when I believe the Lloyd Loom wicker dates to.

Now the bright accents and fresh look of the wicker pull your eye away, so you don’t even notice the old carpet.

I have no idea what we’ll find underneath when we do rip out the gray carpet on this porch, but for now, it’s fine and I’m really pleased with the vintage wicker sporting their new cushions.

So what do you think, you sewing novices… did this seem easy enough to you? Are you encouraged to try your hand at it? It can be a lot more complicated to make cushions, but it doesn’t have to be, and I hope this was enough encouragement to some of you thinking it’s too difficult, to see that it’s really not.

Thank you for stopping by, I appreciate you reading along.

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