If you’d like to update your home’s décor without spending a lot of money on the project, it is often an effective approach to pick and choose a few simple areas that are known to influence the way everything feels around them. For instance, it doesn’t take a lot to improve your cushions and pillowcases. When updated, though, they can somehow make an entire feel far newer than it really is.
Here are 10 ideas to help you update the cushions and pillowcases around your house by yourself.
1. Grab a stencil
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Stenciled covers for cushions and pillows are on trend at the moment. You can pick any simple pattern, cut a stencil for it into a sheet of freezer paper or stenciling film and then use it to paint whatever design you want on your pillow cases. Good ideas are easy to come by – lettering, arrows and flowers, all work.
2. Scrap fabric patterns
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If you’ve been decorating around the house by yourself for even a little while, you’re bound to have plenty of leftover fabric scraps. These can give you all the material that you need to decorate pillowcases with. You simply need to draw a pattern on a pillowcase – say, a tree, a flower or an animal – and use fabric glue to stick cut scraps of colorful fabric on the pattern.
3. A ruffled taffeta pillow
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Hand-stitching fabric into ruffles can take time. If you have the patience, though, nearly anyone can do it — it doesn’t take too much skill. You can learn to do it in a couple of hours. Once you know how to turn a length of fabric into a beautiful ruffle, you’ll have all kinds of ways of using it to decorate a pillowcase. You can fashion it into a frill, a flower in the middle and even make your pillowcase look like a cream cake.
4. A butterfly pillowcase
A butterfly pillowcase is an easy and yet impressive DIY project. All you need is a sheet of felt, a pair of scissors, a butterfly template and a steady hand. One you cut out a dozen butterflies, you simply need to sew each one on your pillowcase. Children love butterflies – a butterfly pillowcase is sure to make any kid in the family happy.
5. A classy silhouette pillowcase
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Heat-and-bond fabric is a great way to decorate a pillowcase. For instance, you can cut this fabric out to form the silhouette of a person’s face, a flower, an animal or anything else and iron it on. You’d end up with a quick creative touch to your pillows and cushions.
6. Make a soft shag pillowcase
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A shag pillowcase is easy enough to be perfect as a first DIY project. Cut up a strip of fabric 3 inches wide. Then, cut the strip up into pieces 2 inches wide. Take each piece, pinch it in the middle to make a sort of bowtie and then sew it to the pillowcase. While it’ll take you the whole day to finish this pillowcase, the fluffiness of the results will be your reward.
7. A sweater for your pillow
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If you have old sweaters at the back of a closet somewhere, you can repurpose them to cover your pillowcases in wonderful softness with. You simply need to cut off the sleeves, seal off the cut edges with a basting stitch to prevent unraveling, wrap the sweater around the pillow and stitch the edges up. If your sweater isn’t big enough to cover pillow, you can use a second one for the back.
8. The pillow that wears a tuxedo
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Find an old, dark shirt with thin white stripes, preferably one that reminds you of a tuxedo. Cut the torso out just below the sleeves and sew the top and the bottom shut. You have your pillowcase ready. You can put it on the pillow making sure that the buttons run down the middle. For the ruffles, cut up a sleeve and sew ruffle on either side of the buttons.
9. A monogrammed pillow
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Just as with the silhouette idea above, you can use iron-on fabric to monogram a pillowcase, too. You’ll need to skillfully cut out a letter in the beautiful, flowing pattern that monogrammed letters known for and then iron it on.
10. A burst of color
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Buttons aren’t simply about fastening things – they are great for decorating with, too. One of the easiest ways to decorate a pillow with buttons is to sew them on in the form of a letter. Then, you can use even more buttons to flesh it out in an aesthetic way. The more colors you use, the prettier the results will be.