Ruffled pillow case sewing tutorial

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Love the look of those farmhouse style pillows? Making your own ruffled pillow case is so easy peasy, you’ll want to make tons of these shabby chic pillows! Just remember: sharing is caring so don’t keep them all for yourself! Your friends will be thrilled to display some of your gorgeous handmade farmhouse pillow covers in their homes!

Ruffle pillow

As you may remember I’m in the process of redesigning Ellie’s room (as I’ve mentioned this when I made this ruffled bed skirt for her room). Since then I made the bed sheet and the duvet cover for the same bed and now it was time for the pillows and this ruffled pillow case tutorial.

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I’m very fond to farmhouse decor and I find it super easy to achieve with just a few simple touches, like ruffles and linen. All the lines in Ellie’s room are simple and neutral but I was afraid if I keep following the same line the room will look boring and totally not appropriate for a girl her age. And I decided to go with ruffles for the bed which is the center of the room. So at this point I got ruffle pillowcases, ruffled bed sheet, ruffled bed skirt and the next project will be…haven’t you guessed yet? A ruffled bed throw.

This ruffled pillow case tutorial is so easy and simple I can barely call it a tutorial. The pillows look so adorable and I love the clean, crisp sense I get every time I look at the bed. It’s sweet but not overly sweet! It’s shabby chic but not too much, it’s farmhouse but still modern. Maybe I’m wrong though I’m no interior designer but to me this room is the perfect balance between modern and rustic decor without a lot of effort.

I made this tutorial for ruffled pillow case but you can easily use the same steps to make ruffled pillow shams. Don’t know the difference? To be fair it’s not much of a difference but it seems that you sleep on pillow covers while pillow shams are used as decorative pieces on pillows you don’t sleep on. So a pillow sham is the princess while the pillow cover is the peasant lol Perfect for my farmhouse style pillows idea, right?

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This ruffled pillow case is very easy simple and pretty quick to put together. The only hard thing I found is fraying the edges on the pillows and ruffles. So the first pillow case was a bit of a nightmare but I did find a solution after taking a moment to reflect on my project. I remembered mom saying linen is the easiest to cut straight because you can just rip it right on the grain.

So I decided to rip the fabric and you know what? Mom was right! (but let’s make this our secret). The fabric ripped straight o the grain so I got super straight strips and the ripping got me a nice frayed edge that I was then able to fray a little more by just pulling a couple of more threads from the edges. After this, the other three pillows where nothing but a breeze!

This ruffled pillow case tutorial is for an envelope pillowcase. The top and the bottom seams of the pillowcase are enclosed in the pillowcase and you’ll need to finish with a serger or a zig zag stitch. The sides of the pillow case are sewn with the fabric right side out so the seam is exposed to the outside and the edges are a bit frayed, to match the ruffles.

Ruffled Pillow Case

Materials:

measuring tape
linen fabric
fabric marker
yardstick (optional but helps a lot)
scissors
matching thread
pins
sewing machine
serger (optional)
pressing iron

Instructions:

Preparing the fabric

Start by measuring your pillows in width and length.
You will have to cut one panel for the front and 2 panels for the back of the pillowcase.

Mark your fabric with a fabric marker; using a yardstick is very helpful. Cut or rip the fabric as follows (I recommend ripping for the frayed effect):

1 panel for the front of the pillowcase, matching your pillow measurements plus an extra 1″ to the width and 4″ to the length. The extra inch is for seam allowance (you’ll sew the top and bottom of the pillow cases using a 1/2″ allowance on each). The extra 4″ (2″ on each side of the pillow case) are to accommodate the ruffles and the seam allowance (which is not enclosed as they typically are on pillowcases but sewn on the outside and exposed).
1 panel for the back that is as wide as the front panel and is half the length of the front panel plus 1″ allowance
1 panel for the back that is as wide as the front panel and is half the length of the front panel plus 1″ allowance plus 5″ for overlapping the first back panel.

For the ruffles, you’ll need two strips twice as long as the width of the pillow (front and back; i.e your pillow is 10″ wide so you have 10″ for the front and 10″ for the back of the pillow; you’ll then need a 40″ strip for 1 ruffle and 40″ strips for the second ruffle).

Preparing the panels

The back panels will need to overlap in the back and create some sort of a “pocket” where you can insert the pillow into the pillowcase.

The raw overlapping edges need to be finished as follows.
Working with one panel at a time, get the overlapping edge, fold 1/2″ and press with your iron. Fold again 1/2″ and press. Get the panel to your sewing machine and run a regular stitch along the pressed edge, using a 1/ seam allowance.

Repeat for the second panel.
Run a small stitch along the sides of each panel (font and back), about 1/2″ away from the frays to prevent over fraying in the future.

Remove 3-4 threads on both sides of each panel.

Attaching all panels together

Place the front panel right side out.
Place the long back panel over the front panel, on the left hand side, wrong side out, sewn edge facing towards the middle of the pillowcase. The front and long back panel should match at the raw sides, top and bottom.
Add the short back panel on the right hand side, wrong side out, sewn edge facing towards the middle of the pillowcase. The front and short back panel should match at the raw sides, top and bottom.
Pin the top and the bottom seams.

Sew down each seam with 1/2″ seam allowance then finish the seam with a serger or a zig zag stitch.
Turn pillowcase right side out.

Making the ruffles

Remove 3-4 threads along both sides of each ruffle strip.
Run a small stitch along one side of each strip.
Ruffle the strips using your preferred method (I’ve got a tutorial for gathering fabric here) to match the width of the pillows as indicated above.

Attaching the ruffles to the pillowcase

Measure 2″ away from each side, mark and trace a line with a fabric marker using a yardstick
Using lots of pins, attach the ruffles following these marks. The edge of the ruffle(the one without the small stitch) should match the line you traced on the pillowcase. Each ruffled strip should go all along each side, from front to back (like a circle)

Sew down from front to the back using a regular stitch.

Repeat for the second ruffled strip and the other end of the pillow case.

Finishing the pillowcase

Now all you have left to do is close the pillowcase ends.
Fold the ruffles towards the inside of the pillowcase and pin to the pillowcase to get them out of your way.

This way the side edges will be exposed and you can sew down the back and front panels together with a regular stitch, using a 1″ allowance.
Remove the pins.
Insert your pillow into your ruffled pillow case using the pocket in the back. Enjoy!