From Placemats to Seat Cushions

7 Materials
$10
30 Minutes
Easy

Seeing these bright placemats, inspired me. Since they are already water repellent fabric, I figured they would make fun seat cushions for my iron outdoor chairs with minimal effort.

Placemat cushions

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The placemats had a layer of material on both the front and back. I opened up one seam with a stitch ripper.

Opening up one seam

After opening up the seam, I measured a piece of foam and marked it where I needed to cut it.

Measuring foam to fit inside placemat

Since I didn’t need the cushion foam to be cut perfectly, I just used scissors to cut it to size.

Get scissors to cut foam to size

I then folded the foam like a taco and inserted it into the placemat.

Opened placemat ready for foam

Once foam was inside, I hand sewed the open end closed and put them on my chair. I love the bright colors of my new cushions. Pretty easy project and if you can machine sew, the converting of a placemat to a cushion would be even faster and easier.

Hand sewing seam back shut

I now have cushions that fit my chairs fairly well. You need to be sure the placemats you use have two fabric layers so you can use them like a pillow case once you open the seam. You also need to be sure that they fit your chair size. My chairs were 12” x 15” at the top and 12” x 12” at the seats.

The water repellent placemats were perfect to use for my chairs on my covered porch. Now there’s a nice splash of color along with added comfort when folks sit outside. Since I got everything at the thrift store, my total cost to do 2 chairs was $10. You can buy placemats pretty much anywhere that has a section for home goods and foam can usually be found at any craft store.

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