Hi all,
I was a bit tired of constantly buying new pillows and decided to renew some old ones by re-filling them. This process is the same as for filling pillows from scratch. The only difference is that if you are filling new pillows you won’t have to mix the fillings. You will just stuff the filling into the pillow. This will work with store bought pillows that are not foam based.
Needed tools
Needle,
thread of color that is easily visible on the pillow
scissors,
seam ripper,
pillow with a loose filling
new filling
The process is fairly simple. It consists of ripping a seam, just enough so your hand can go through. Stuffing the filling trough the hole. Then using a contrasting thread closing the hole in the seam with a simple straight or running stitch. Nothing could be easier 🙂
Here’s video of the procedure:
Some tips and tricks
- While doing this make sure you only rip the seam enough to let your hand with filling pass through. The hand should pass through the hole in the seam with no effort. Do not make a super snug hole. that will only make your life miserable because the filling will fly all over the place.
- When stitching make sure that you don’t make a big hole between the visible stitches on one side. The stitches should be fairly small or your filling will be flying out of the pillow. You do not need to make it super small. But do take some time to make a nice looking running stitch that is nice and tight.
- Make sure your fillings are compatible. I would not use down or feathers together with a synthetic filling.
- If you have any flaps in the fabric, make sure that the stitch goes through the tip of the flap. That way the flap is sealed, and you won’t have any issues with the filling that is running away from your pillow 🙂
- You can finish up with a sewing machine, but running stitch is so easy to do by hand, there really is no need to use a machine. Also when you are going to refill your pillow, your manual stitch will be so much easier to undo, you will be soo happy you took a couple of minutes more to make it by hand.
Conclusion
While we are now so used to just buying a new pillow every time the old one looses its fluff, the truth is that fillings pillow is an easy task. It is also a cheap task. Buying a new pillow is way more expensive that filling the old one when the filling gets smushed. And if you have chickens or ducks, you will even produce your own filling, making it extra affordable and giving your birds one more plus. I hope I helped you out a bit, and that the next time you will refill your pillow instead of just buying a new one 🙂