Making neutral, beige and pale coloured cushions

I have recently made some new cushions to sell at this seasons craft fairs. Customers seem most interested in pale, beige and neutral colours, as these go with any sort of furnishings.

So here is a fairly simple way to put together a cushion, followed by some variations on the theme.

Firstly find a ready made cushion that is plain or slightly textured. You can make your own, but sometimes it is quite nice to save a little time!! Find some heavy weight good quality fabric to make a front panel. I used curtain fabric. This was a remnant from a curtain shop. It means you can just buy a small amount rather than a whole metre of fabric.

Then sew this on to the front of your cushion. I do this by hand, as I can get the tension more accurate. Also it is sometimes a bit bulky for the machine.  It is important to always make your panel at least 2 inches ( 5cms) bigger than the cushion, so as you can neatly turn all the rough edges under.

  I then cut up some small pieces of beige, neutral and brown fabrics. I ironed on some fabric stiffener to make them a bit stronger and more solid.

Using a Sissix machine, and some floral dies I cut out a selection of fabric flowers.

I then sewed these on to the cushion front. Some were sewn as a single flower, and some were layered up. I finished each flower with a button.

This one has already sold.

I also made some other ones using a similar colour scheme.

The one pictured below was made using similar techniques. However I constructed the entire front first, before sewing it on. This was due to the fact I made this one out of a lot more layers.  I started with a medium weight piece of beige cotton. I added the irregular stripes of taupe brown silky fabric  and a few rows of gold stitching by machine.

I then covered everything with a gold sequinned piece of netting.  The final details were adding some stripes of cream lace and the fabric flowers as before.

Another recent cushion, that I sold last weekend, is this one below.

The front panel on this was made from a heavy weight piece of white cotton.  I sewed on several different strips of lace and ribbon. I also machine stitched across the surface many times with different pale coloured cottons and stitching styles.  All the decoration was wavy , overlapping and uneven. It created a slightly puckered look to the fabric, which added to the overall texture.  When all the details were done I hand sewed the panel on to a beige cushion.

These were quite fun to do. I haven't made any new cushions for awhile. I am now full of ideas...so watch this space!!