How to Make a No Sew DIY Bench Seat Cushion (Easy!)
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Hi friends! Today I am sharing how to make a no sew DIY bench seat cushion easily and affordably. If you’ve been hoping for a bench cushion but thought it may never happen due to no sewing skills or sewing machine, I’m here to give you some hope! I do not sew. I repeat, I do not sew! This simple project requires zero sewing abilities, very few supplies, and can be done in just a couple of hours.
We made our bench seat cushion to fit our dining bench, but obviously this can be applied to any bench or window seat in your home! We built our DIY banquette bench last year out of a half wall that connects our kitchen and living room. So a dining bench just makes sense! That being said, at the time we left it without a cushion due to the age of our children. I worried that a cushion would be hard to keep clean from spilled foods and dirty feet. But boy, can I just tell you – I’ve learned a dining bench the length of ours (almost 9 feet) is difficult to keep clean, period. So I’m no longer sacrificing comfort!
We love to linger here after family dinner. It’s our board game hang out, morning coffee nook, and long dinner chat spot – and my desire was for this to be cozy to sit for an extended period of time. In comes our no sew DIY bench seat cushion!
SUPPLIES YOU WILL NEED FOR YOUR NO SEW SIY BENCH SEAT CUSHION:
Fabric (we got our beautiful fabric and throw pillows from Tonic Living)
Foam (we used this affordable upholstery cushion). We chose a 3 inch thick foam for a quality look.
Heavy Duty Scissors (we used kitchen sheers)
Plywood (we used this plywood from Home Depot and joined it together in the middle with brackets to meet the length of our bench)
Staple Gun
Measuring Tape
And because I feel like our Tonic Living throw pillows complete our bench, I’m linking those here, as well! Carlin(cream with tan stripes), Zola(indigo flowers), Valentina lumbar pillow.
HOW TO PLAN FOR A DIY NO SEW BENCH CUSHION:
1. Measure the length and width of your bench.
The first thing you will need to do before you begin anything is to measure the length and width of your bench. In our case, this was 9 feet in length and 16 inches in width! This is important moving forward, so you know what size foam and how much fabric you will need.
2. Purchase foam based on your measurements.
I’ve seen people use a variety of foam for bench cushions (memory foam mattress toppers, egg crate mattress toppers included). And while this can be the more affordable route if you’re on a budget, we chose to go with upholstery foam so that this would keep it’s shape and hold up to high traffic!
Here is the exact foam we purchased from Amazon, and it comes in different lengths. I highly recommend getting a 3 inch foam for a quality look.
3. Purchase plywood.
You will want a piece of wood or plywood cut to the width and length of your bench. This gives the fabric something to attach to without having to sew.
We couldn’t find a piece of plywood long enough for our bench (9 feet), so we cut two sections to width of bench, then used brackets to join them.
4. Purchase fabric for your no-sew cushion cover.
You’ll want to make sure you take your measurements and then order a bit more than necessary, so make sure you order plenty of fabric. In our case, this was 9 feet in length, so we ordered 3 1/2 yards of fabric from Tonic Living. My HIGHEST recommendation in choosing your fabric is to choose something quality and highly durable. This is where Tonic Living came in for me!
We technically needed just 3 yards, but we wanted wiggle room on each end to be safe. The fabric is 51″ width, so that gave us plenty of wiggle room! We chose a durable, high performance fabric from Tonic Living in an earthy, medium gray that would be easy to clean and easily hide dirt (Grafton Fabric, Portobello).
Here is a post on how we chose the fabric and pillows for our bench.
The quality is out of this world, I could not believe it when I opened up our delivery! This fabric is thick, textured, and absolutely stunning. I can already tell this will wipe down easily! The thickness and quality of the bench fabric made this project easier, as the fabric was easy to maneuver.
See more photos of the fabric we chose here.
STEP-BY-STEP HOW TO MAKE A DIY BENCH SEAT CUSHION:
1. Cut the foam down to the length of your bench/plywood base.
Mark your cut line on your foam with sharpie all the way around with a straight edge (we used our wall level). I highly recommend making sure to work off an already flat edge of your foam, so you have one side that is perfect.
We used a box cutter to break the foam all the way around, and then cut the remainder of the foam with kitchen sheers. We used kitchen sheers because it’s what we had on hand, but I’d recommend heavy duty scissors or even an electric knife.
We actually found that the upholstery foam was fairly easy to cut, but it did take some work to get it even, so if you have an electric carving knife – you’ll be quicker and more precise. You want the edges of the foam to be as smooth as you can manage.
2. Lay out your fabric on a flat surface.
Your next step is to lay out your fabric on a flat surface. Because of how big our bench is, I had to use our front living room floor. However, if you are making a shorter cushion, feel free to save your back and work off a table *insert sweating emoji*.
Make sure to get your fabric perfectly straight before adding foam and plywood. Tonic Living recommended that our fabric not be ironed, but lucky for me it is so thick and high-quality that there were no wrinkles whatsoever – even straight out of the shipping box.
3. Add foam and plywood.
As your foam will be at the top, it will go down first onto your fabric. Make sure you get the foam piece as centered and straight as possible, especially if you are working with a patterned fabric. Our fabric has a very subtle stripe pattern that I triple checked for accuracy!
I’m aware that one side of the foam is not as smooth as the other, but we planned for non-smoothe side to be the back and the smooth side to be the front. Again, if we had used an electric knife, we could have gotten a much straighter line.
4. Trim excess fabric.
When trimming the extra fabric around the cushion, I recommend leaving at least 3 inches of fabric when pulled tight over the plywood. I was scared to cut it too close and then not have enough fabric to pull it taut, but you do not want a bunch of loose fabric – so somewhere in the middle! You can always trim excess after stapling as well.
I found that kitchen sheers worked great with the quality fabric we used from Tonic Living, but I’m sure fabric scissors would work best 😉
I went back and trimmed even more off the left side before proceeding to the right.
Fold your fabric over the plywood at the ends before trimming to make sure you are leaving enough fabric to work with.
5. Staple the side edges of fabric to the bottom of the plywood, leaving the corners undone.
Making sure that your fabric is straight and there are no bumps or bulges anywhere, you will use a staple gun and staple along the sides every 1 inch. So yes, you will use a lot of staples for this!
You will stop 4 inches from each corner and leave fabric undone. This will allow you to make a tidy corner at the end.
I worked in sections, pulling the fabric as tight as possible. You can do this alone – I did the first half by myself. But it’s definitely quicker moving with a second set of hands! You want this to be a tighter fit, so do not be afraid of pulling too taut. It took some real muscle effort for me!
*If you want to make extra sure this fabric doesn’t go anywhere, you could opt to glue or hot glue the fabric to the board before stapling. You could also use a spray adhesive. We did not do this, but I’ve seen other tutorials that do.
When you are done stapling the sides, your corners will look like this.
6. Fold and staple your corners.
This is the hardest part of the whole thing. And honestly, it’s not hard once you’ve done the first corner – because you’ll know exactly how to do it then! But this part is very much like wrapping the corner of a present.
I tucked the outside fabric into the inside and then folded it over to make neat, square corners. You also may have to remove a staple in order to get the fabric to tuck exactly right. It’s no biggie it all. Pop it out with a screwdriver and then re-staple when you’re done.
Do not be afraid to trim the fabric if it’s too bulky. I trimmed down every corner until it laid flat. Make sure to “test” the fold by holding it in place and flipping it over to see how looks on the top before you staple it.
Tuck and fold the fabric underneath the opposite side, just like you would with wrapping a gift.
Make sure that you have no bunching on the ends before stapling.
This really was a simple project that almost anyone can do!
This DIY bench seat cushion is an easy way to add comfort and beauty to your home! And the best part is that this simple DIY project can be done in just one day.
Until next time,
Courtney
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