How to Cover a Bobbin Lace Pillow

A dark colored pillow cover makes the lace threads stand out clearly.

A cookie or mushroom bobbin lace pillow is a basic tool for lacemaking. Bobbin pillows should be stuffed firmly with straw, bran or ethafoam and are generally covered with a tightly-woven, natural-fiber fabric. The cover on a bobbin lace pillow provides the work surface for lacemaking and should be durable enough to stand up to being repeatedly pricked by pins. Making a cover for a cookie pillow is a simple project and sets you up for success with your lacemaking.

Things You'll Need

• 1 yard close-woven dark cotton fabric
• Uncovered cookie pillow
• Measuring tape
• Chalk
• White glue
• Thumbtacks
• Staple gun
• Scissors

Instructions

1. Measure the diameter of your cookie pillow. Add 10 inches to the diameter and then divide that number in half. This will be the radius of the fabric cover.

2. Spread out the fabric on a flat surface. Set a thumbtack through the hole in the metal tab at the end of your measuring tape and pin straight down through the center point of the fabric. Use your chalk at the tape's point for your radius measurement and rotate the tape around the pin, marking as you go to create a circle.

3. Cut out the circle of fabric. Lay out the circle flat on a work surface and center the cookie pillow face-down over the fabric.

4. Pull the top of the fabric circle up over the edge of the pillow and use a thumbtack to pin it in place. The fabric should be firm around the domed pillow surface, but not too tight. Repeat at the bottom of the fabric, then at the right and left points.

5. Wrap up the fabric up around the edge of the pillow at the points between each of the four pins and tack them down so there are eight pins holding the fabric in place.

6. Go back around the pillow and pull the fabric tighter around the edge, moving in the same pattern as you put in the pins. Make two or three passes around the pillow if necessary to get the fabric as tight over the pillow as it will go without distorting.

7. Staple the fabric down around the bottom edge of the pillow, overlapping the rows of staples so that the folds of fabric are pressed down flat and the fabric is secured tightly to the base. Remove the thumbtacks only after the cover has been stapled in place.

Tips & Warnings

• Cotton twill, cotton duck and washable wool gabardine all make good cookie pillow covers.

• Hem a few 13-inch squares of the same fabric you use for the pillow cover to use as drapes to cover the lacemaking project between work sessions.