Plaid wool blanket throw pillow DIY and long lumbar

Plaid wool blanket throw pillow DIY and long lumbar

• 1.25.2021

It's been a loooong, long time since I did an "upcycle" of a vintage or older garment/home decor piece into something new. That used to be half my posts, back when this was a sewing blog! But I didn't need more and more homemade stuff all the time, and my style changed, and I have way less time for sewing now. But, back to my roots! I recently rename a vintage wool plaid throw blanket into three, unique throw pillows and I LOVE them!

Oh, but not only that--I also made a custom down-filled extra long lumbar pillow using fill from two old pillows we had. It was very messy, but so cool!

My mom had this brown wool throw blanket she didn't use anymore. I remembered it and thought it would be great for a unique statement lumbar pillow on our bed! I'm mixing black, brown, tan, and green in there (not done yet).

DIY extra long lumbar pillow

Not long ago I went through our linen closet and realized there was no point in storing a couple of old, floppy, no longer comfortable down/feather pillows. But, I thought they'd be good for a custom size throw pillow insert! I saved them.

Now that we have a king bed, I wanted a reeeeeally long lumbar pillow. I did some research on the ideal size... there is no one right size, but a king size pillow for your head is 20"x36", and I definitely wanted it longer and skinnier than that. I looked at the wool blanket I was using and made sure my lumbar cover would avoid a few moth holes, and settled on 12"x42".

No good photos of this part, but I did screen shot my Instagram stories I did while making it late one evening! I used a very tightly woven outdoor fabric I had for the pillow insert.

I cut open the old down pillows, and... shoveled the down and feathers in!

It was very messy.

I stuffed till it felt right, then sewed it shut!

I wanted to keep the blanket fringe on one end of the pillow! So I sewed right sides together for three sides (after installing the zipper on one of the long sides) and left the fourth side open with the fringe I hadn't cut off.

Then I flipped it right side out, pressed lightly (carefully on the wool), and sewed the fringe end closed.

I'm so happy with it!!

Still figuring out this room, but I really love having something unique like this! It could probably work with a couple of large square pillows behind, too! And I could make another cover for my 12"x42" lumbar like in the spring or summer.

DIY pillow covers out of wool throw blanket

Well, I was so excited about my upcycling success, and I still had plenty of the blanket left over... so I made two more! I worked around the moth holes again and used a natural colored denim for the back of these.

One small lumbar (the IKEA poly fill lumbar from ages ago) and a 20"? 22"? I don't remember square pillow. The plaid was only in the corners of the blanket so I put it off to one side rather than centered.

I could have been more careful with where I put the plaids (e.g. bottom right of both) and the blanket is reversible so I had that option, but they'll never be right next to each other and the size isn't the same, anyway.

I ordered a couple of brown Indian cottons for other throw pillows for this couch and I think it definitely needs some more pattern! But loving the 100% wool higher quality blanket fabric, and that it's unique!