Glam Your Bed Pillow Sew-Along Week Five- The Bolster Pillow

Last week, we made the lovely Round Pillow.

First, a word about the fabric. Choose your fabric wisely. For these pillows, I recommend a nice, home decor fabric. I was super lucky to find an entire bolt of fabric that I wanted to use at a craft sale, but if you don’t already have a fabric that you want to use, I wouldn’t try to scrap by with cheap fabric.

I choose two types of fabric. One matched the main color that my bed already is, the other is an accent color that coordinated with the main color fabric. If you choose to make all your pillows from the same fabric, you will need 5-6 yards. If you want to make the pillows different colors, then you can break that amount up a a little bit.

The inspiration for all of these pillow was given to me by an article 2000 Better Homes and Gardens Sewing Magazine. I altered the plans somewhat to fit the materials that I had on hand. I’ve attempted to find a site to link to, but I can’t find one- maybe the magazine is no longer in publication. I don’t know.

If you participated since the beginning, you should now have four new pillows on your bed: the ribbon pillow, the quilted pillow, the embellished pillow, and the round pillow.
  

The Bolster Pillow

• 2 yards of fabric- cut one 31″ by 55″ rectangle (CENTER piece) and two 6″ by 31″ rectangles (END pieces) out of the fabric
• 2 yards of 1/4″ or 1/2″ covered piping (see {This Post} on how to cover piping and {This Post} on how to apply piping)
• 2 large covered buttons- I used 2″ diameter buttons (see {This Post} on how to cover your own buttons)
• 1 XL size bag of fiberfill
• Coordinating thread
• Scissors
• Sewing machine

Step One:

Take your 2 yards of covered piping and cut it in half. Pin one yard of the piping to one 31″ end of the CENTER piece. Sew in place. For instructions on covering or applying piping, see the links in the supply list.

Do the same for the opposite end of the CENTER piece.

Step Two:

Pin one 6″  by 31″ END rectangle to one 31″ end of the CENTER piece, RIGHT sides together. The applied piping should be in between the two pieces of fabric. Sew in place. See the picture below for the finished piping in between the two layers (ignore the “hand baste all the way around”. We’ll get to that in a minute).

Repeat step two at the opposite end of the CENTER piece.

Step Three:

You now have one very long piece of fabric. RIGHT sides together, fold it in half, matching long raw edges. Pin along the raw edges and sew in place with a 1/2″ seam allowance.

Step Four:

Turn fabric right side out. Insert fiberfill. Take your time doing this and pack it tightly. Move it around until there are no lumps. Leave about one inch of space at each end for closing the pillow.

Step Five:

Using heavy thread, hand baste allow the raw edge of both ends of the pillow. ( I am showing you this step without the fiberfill in the end because it is easier to photograph and demonstrate. At this point, your pillow should be stuffed)
For more info on hand basting, see the tutorial {Here}.

Pull the ends of the basted thread tightly so that the END fabric gathers and holds in the fiberfill. Hand sew the gathers in place.

Step Six:

Cover your buttons. Need help? See {This Tutorial}. Hand sew one covered button to each end of the pillow. Or hot glue.

What a finale piece! If you’ve been participating in the Pillow Sew-Along from the beginning, your finished bed should look like this:

Beautiful!! I’d say this final Bolster Pillow can be completed in 1 to 2 naptimes, depending on your skill level. 

Now-  I want to see your pillows! Feel free to link them at my Things I’ve Done Thursday party, to my Facebook page, or to my blog Flickr page. I also want to hear your comments!

Linking to these great parties!