How to Make a Pillow Cover With Felt Flowers

Decorate a felt flower with sequins and embroidery to add pizazz..

Felt flowers add texture or an accent color to your decorating scheme A pillow completely covered with layers of closely space petals, all in the same shade, adds loads of interesting texture to a monochromatic room. Use a simpler pillow with three contrasting flowers in one corner to add a touch of the room's accent color on the sofa. Felt requires no additional finishing after it is cut, so the same basic techniques can be used to create endless variations. With a 12-inch-square pillow form and beginner sewing skills you can make a custom felt-flower pillow cover.

Things You'll Need

• 44-inch-wide twill fabric, 1/2 yard
• Tape measure
• Scissors
• Ironing board
• Iron
• Ruler
• Tailor's chalk
• Compass
• Paper
• Pins
• Felt
• 3/4-inch buttons
• Needle
• Thread
• Sewing machine

Instructions

1. Cut a 13-inch piece of 44-inch-wide fabric. Cut from one selvage to the other. The selvage is the woven band at the edge of the fabric. You will have a 44-by-13-inch rectangle.

2. Lay the fabric right side down on an ironing board and make a fold 8 inches from one of the short ends. You will be folding one selvage edge toward the center. Iron the fold. Fold and iron the other short end in the same way.

3. Turn the fabric over and draw a line 8 inches from each of the folded ends. The space in the center between these lines is the front of the pillow.

4. Make flower patterns by drawing 3- and 4-inch circles. Draw evenly spaced lines from the center of each circle to the edge. Draw a 1/2-inch circle in the center of the larger circle. Draw a petal shape around each of the lines, going from the inner circle to the edge. For shapely flowers, cut out a petal pattern and trace around it to make each petal.

5. Cut flowers from felt. Stack a small flower on a large flower. Place the stack on the pillow cover with the center inside the area you marked as the front. Place the center at least 1 1/2 inches inside the edges of the front.

6. Place a button in the center of the flower and sew it on. Stitch through all three layers of fabric. Sew on additional flowers in the same way.

7. Fold any flower petals that are within 1 inch of the edge of the fabric toward the center, and pin them down. This keeps them out of the seam when you sew up the pillow cover.

8. Fold the sides of the fabric over the front of the pillow along the chalk lines. The folded edges should overlap 4 inches. This forms the opening for inserting the pillow form.

9. Sew the top and bottom of the pillow cover closed by sewing a straight seam 1/2 inch from the cut edges. Sew through all layers of fabric. This seam holds the folds in place. Turn the cover right side out and remove any pins. Brush off the chalk.

Tips & Warnings

• Use a protractor to space the lines for the petals evenly on the pattern. For a five-petal flower space the lines 72 degrees apart.