Shades of Blue Patchwork Seating Pillows - Upcycling of Old Jeans

During the years, I kept my old Jeans which didn't fit anymore or just had one too many holes. I never new what to do with them, but I somehow knew one day I would have the perfect use for them. When my boyfriend and I were working on our camper project (transforming an old ambulance into a camper van), I just knew what I should use them for - seating pillows!

So, I cut the Jeans up, got some cushions, zippers and a lot of dark blue thread and started sewing!

• A number of old jeans - ideally in different shades of blue
• LOTS of blue thread
• Dark blue zippers
• Sewing machine
• Hot iron, rotary cutter, patchwork ruler, cutting mat

I made two different sizes: One for the backrest and one for the seating area (two of each).

General information:

• Basic size of the squares: 10 x 10 cm
• Seam allowance: 1 cm on each side (not included in the mentioned measurements)
• Cushion thickness 4 cm
• For the sides, I also used upcycled Jeans fabric
• For the back, any fabric that you have lying around can be used - Depending on possible visibility choose the colour carefully
• Zippers: I didn't use ready-made, unpartable zippers, but rather some where you can define your own length to customize them for my project

Description seating area pillow:

• Size 40 x 80
• Zipper on long back side, 76 cm long

Description backrest pillow:

• Size 25 x 80 cm
• Zipper on long lower side, 76 cm long

Supplies:

• Old jeans
• Lots of blue thread
• "Infinite" zippers
• Sewing machine
• Rotary cutter
• Cutting mat

I cut my jeans into patches of 12 x 12, 22 x 12 and very few into 22 x 22. For the backrest, I needed a height of 25 cm, so I inserted a row in the middle of 7 x 7 cm. These measurements include the seam allowance.

Lay them out on the floor and rearrange them until you are satisfied with how the sizes and colors of the patches are collaborating with each other. Take some time to do this, it will be worth it! Also, a second pair of eyes or sleeping on it for a night helps a lot.

A rotary cutter and large patchwork ruler, which are one of the standard tools for each patchwork project, will help you get straight lines and makes your life so much easier.

Next step is to sew all parts together. Always take two patches, lay them face to face and sew along the seam (1 cm from the edge). Afterwards, take the hot iron and iron the two parts on the back to each side. This will make the whole seating area smoother and reduce the stress on your sewing needle. In general, I recommend a sewing needle that is intended for jeans.

For the zippers, I used the type you can customize yourself to the correct length. This was my first time sewing that type of zipper, so if you are as new as I was, I checked on YouTube for instructions. This one e.g. can explain way better than I how to work with that. This here is in German, but pictures / videos speak more than words, right?

For measurements: I inserted the zipper in the middle of the 4 cm wide side. which means that left and right you need a strip of 2 x 80 (4 x 82 with seam allowance) of jeans fabric.

Since I chose a square cushion style which has also a side part, I had to sow a "ring" for each cushion. Therefore, I first prepared the zipper strip (see step before) and cut the other three parts in the correct size. Then I sew all of them together in a large ring. For nicer corners, you should not sew over the hole width of the strip (which would be 6 cm) but leave out the seam allowance.

There is a nice explanation here, by Olivia Twist.

For the final assembly, take the ring you just finished and align it right side on right side with the top of your pillows. Be careful on the corners and align them carefully. Sew around

Then open the zipper and attach the back side also right to right on the ring and sew. With this patchwork approach there will be a lot of threads hanging around, cut them away as well as possible (it will get stuck in the zippers otherwise), turn the pillow case around and you're done!

I was very enthusiastic when cutting the jeans patches, so I had some
leftover. It turned out to be very famous among friends and family, so I made some more cushions as presents :-)