foyer bench seat cushion

in a post at the beginning of the year, i confessed to not being a new year's resolutioner but instead, a new year's home projects dreamer. for 2016, i had three d.i.y. projects planned. the first project was making and hanging guest room shelves, the second was repainting our footed bathtub and the last was making a foyer bench seat cushion which i finished this weekend (insert pat on the back).

 

as with the footed bathtub, this project has been ten years in the waiting. when we renovated our house, we had a wooden locker/storage area built in the foyer by the front door our family uses most. a good first stop drop spot to hang backpacks, coats, leashes, toss shoes, shelve sunglasses, keys, footballs, etc. etc. etc....

 it has been a brilliant (the word essential could be used here as well) and much used addition to our family's comings and goings through the years. i had always planned on sewing a cushion for the bench as a comfortable spot to sit and take off shoes, sit and tie shoes, sit and communicate last minute arrangements before heading out. but alas, i never got to it until now but now that it's done, i'd like to share the process in case you have a cushion you've also been meaning to make for a decade. 

this was a discover-as-you-go project as i had a picture in my head of what i wanted but no instructions. 

here is how it went.......

first, i gathered all of my materials:

large 3" thick foam pad

large exacto knife

yardstick

black marker

scissors

glue gun

safety pins

large roll of 3" wide jute tape

 i had always planned on sewing a covering for a foam pad but what i decided to do in the end was weave a covering using jute tape/webbing. i love the natural color, durability and texture of this product.

next, i cleared e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g off the wood lockers and gave it a good wipe down and polish. (bonus: found a missing shoe, key, lens cap and long lost scarf)

 i measured the wood bench space and marked the measurements on the foam pad using the exacto knife to cut to size.

i measured and cut one long strip of the 3" wide jute tape to cover the entire 3" thick edge of the foam pad and safety-pinned the ends of the tape together. 

next, with the jute taped edges of the foam pad in place, i held one end of the jute tape at the top edge and wrapped the jute tape the length of the back side, edge, top, edge of foam pad pinning jute tape ends together on the back side of the pad. i continued this step using separate long lengths of jute tape laid side by side until the foam pad was covered. it took 5 long lengths to cover my foam pad.

now the foam pad is completely covered top, bottom and edges with lengths of jute tape. next, working the width of the foam pad, i wove a shorter length of jute tape over and under the exisiting longer lengths of jute along the back side, edge, top and edge of foam pad safety-pinning edges of jute together on the back side. i continued this step using separate shorter lengths of jute tape laid side by side until finished. it took 18 separate shorter lengths to finish the weave on my foam pad. almost done and looking good.

*all of the pinned ends of jute tape are located on the back side of the pad.

to finish, i was debating between hand sewing all of the pinned jute tape ends together or using a glue gun. in the end, i decided to use hot glue to secure the tape ends together which also stopped any fraying. it worked well.

finally, i flipped the finished cushion over and fit it on the bench.......

tah dah.

love, love it!

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