Appliqued Throw Pillows

I’ve been busy this week sewing throw pillows for my entryway bench.  I wanted pillows with fun colors, designs and texture.  The green pillow has a reverse applique of a repeating pattern, and the blue one has just a regular applique of a pretty flourish.  Best part is, I cut the designs with my Cameo!  I’ll admit, I thought I was going to have a “craft fail” on my hands trying to cut such detailed designs on fabric, but that machine never ceases to amaze me!  It worked great!

I think the reverse applique looks so neat.  Wouldn’t this technique make amazing quilt squares?!

Look at that detail!

I used both the sewable and clean cut Silhouette interfacing for this project.  Right now you can get some great bundles from Silhouette that include both types of interfacing and some other goodies.  The bundles include:

1. 1 of each fabric interfacing, 1 fabric blade, 1 $25 download card: $29.99
2. 1 Silhouette Portrait™, 1 of each fabric interfacing, 1 fabric blade, 1 $25 download card: $129.99
3. 1 Silhouette CAMEO®, 1 of each fabric interfacing, 1 fabric blade, 1 12×24 cutting mat: $269.99

To get the special prices you must click HERE to get to the page for the promotion and use code CUTESY at checkout.

Now on to the tutorial!  The pillow forms I used were 18″, and I used 1/2″ seams throughout.  For the reverse applique pillow, cut four 11″ squares out of your fabric.

Iron sewable interfacing onto the back of each square and peel off the paper backing.

I created this design myself, especially for this project.  You can get it for free here.  (You won’t be able to see a preview of the image, but you should still be able to download it.  Email me if you have any problems.)  Center the design onto the 11″ x 11″ piece of fabric.  It doesn’t need to be perfect because you will be trimming it down once the cutting is done.

Trim each of the squares 1″ from the edge of the design.

You should end up with 10″ squares.  Measure before you cut just to be sure!

Cut out four 10″ squares of a contrasting fabric (I used a natural linen).  So you should now have four squares with a design and four plain squares.

Iron your plain squares onto the backs of your design squares.

Now sew around each of the cutout parts on all four of your squares.  This part takes forever, but the look is worth it!

Pin and sew two of your squares, right sides together, with a 1/2″ seam.  Do the same with the other two, and then sew them all together.  Iron all of your seams flat. When you are done, you should have a 19″ square that will be the front of your pillow.

The blue throw pillow was much easier.  I really liked this swirly flourish from the Silhouette online store, so I made it as big as I could with my 12″ cutting mat.  This time I used the clean cut interfacing so I wouldn’t have to do any sewing.  I just ironed it onto the back of some natural colored linen, peeled of the paper backing, and ironed it onto my 19″ square for the front of my pillow.  Since the fabric was linen, I used the settings to cut fabric, but slowed down the blade a bit, and put the blade depth to 4.  It cut beautifully!

For the backs of the pillows, you will need another 19″ square and a 15″ square to make the cording.  At this point, you can look up how to make a throw pillow with cording, or you can check out the tutorial that I will be posting here soon.

Cutesy Crafts is an affiliate of Silhouette America and will receive a commission if my promo code is used. As part of Silhouette’s promotion, I was given a free product to use. All opinions are my own. To read my full disclosures click here.