Making the bed part two: the mattress

Making the bed: the mattress

Now I had made a bed, I needed a mattress. Obviously I couldn’t go buy one, and I’m not going to commission someone to make it when I can attempt it myself.

I had the remains of a mattress topper that I had kept for a long time with the idea that I’d use it to make a mattress.

The material was a canvas, and pretty thick. But I thought it would do to give the idea of a quality item, and the fact that it was from an item that had been used for a while meant it wasn’t fresh looking (but wasn’t soiled in any way!).

I had restrictions in the size I could make the piece, so there wasn’t much guesswork. Basically it needs to fit into the base of the bed without straining the frame, or looking too loose.

So I cut out a card template that fitted into the base—but left a space around it that I thought would be enough for the fabric.

I then cut out pieces that would cover the piece of card well, and enough to make the sides. Plus, I cut a long piece of string. And I cut another template as I realised I needed two!

I then covered the card with the larger pieces of fabric. Nothing fancy, just an anchoring stitch that I zigzagged up the length, a tacking stick that got the fabric as tight as I could get it.

I wish I’d paid a bit more attention to the lines in the fabric, they’re not far off, but it would have been better if they had been straight.

For the sides, I took the long strips and folded them over themselves, pinning them in place.

I also created piping for the edges.

This was two long strips of material longer than the perimeter of the mattress. I cut a piece of string down so it was just slightly longer than that.

I folded the material in half and put pins in along the length, making sure the string was tightly held in the top.

Then I sewed along the edge, again making sure the string was trapped (but not sewn in place).

My original intention was to sew it inside out, then turn it the right way out. However, I realised that I could do it right way out just as easily.

At one end of the piping, I folded the fabric over to make sure it would be as neat as possible, but I didn’t cut down the string until I was ready to finish.

When I started to sew, I had the base of the mattress, with the piping tight up against the edge. I put in tiny stitches to join the two together.

I found the easiest way to do this was to pin into the card and fabric all the way around. The start and end of the piping was the same place, of course, and I tried to get it as centrally as I could.

Once the edges joined up, I folded over the edge of the piping again so both pieces joined, and chopped off all the excess material and string. I sewed both edges together.

I repeated this for the other half of the mattress so I now had a top and bottom with piping. I just had to join them together.

This needed the side piece. I left the pins in as I didn’t want to have the stitches showing.

As with the piping, I folded over the edge ready for stitching together when I reached back at that point again. However, that was not done until nearly the end.

To sew it on, I went though the piping, and into the side.

Then back through to finish the stitch.

I had to be careful to keep the stitches under the piping, but also not to go over the piping with the thread, it was a strict though and back.

The first layer attached to the sides (almost complete):

The bottom of the mattress (although there is no real top or bottom, it’s dual sided), was done in the same way.

I made sure the pins were on the outside now, so I could remove them easily.

Before I closed it off completely, I removed the card from both sides by cutting the tacking stitches, and sliding the card out.

I stuffed the mattress with feathers.

It’s always best to stuff them as well as you can, more is always better.

I then sewed up the end piece of the sides, and finished off sewing up the top.

This gave me a basic mattress.

And a bonus, it fit inside the bed perfectly!

But I wanted a traditional model with buttons. However, I knew I wouldn’t be able to buy buttons of the right size, I would have to make them.

I had a couple of buttons that were about the right size, so I decided to try them out.

However, once they were covered with material, the looked too bulky and didn’t work.

So instead, I bought some “cover your own” buttons. These had a metal base and metal topper. You would wrap the fabric around the topper, and hammer it onto the base. Instant button.

However, the fabric was too thick to work. But I realised if I just used the base, I could create the same effect, and really neatly, too.

I started by creating a rough template of a circle larger than the button base, and cutting it out of the fabric. I used interfacing this time to help hold the button together, I wish I’d used it on the rest of the mattress, but that’s inexperience for you!

This is the button base with fabric. You can see the little teeth on the button, plus that there’s space in there to push in the material.

I tucked as much material into this void as I could, and started to sew the back of the fabric together until it was as small and neat as I could get it.

I made a good handful of the buttons, and used them to work out how I wanted the buttons to be positioned.

The end choice was a pretty classic configuration. I wanted the buttons to be evenly spaced so it looked professional.

I created another card template, one that was the same size as the top of the mattress.

I marked up thirds lengthways, being careful to account for the piping.

Next, I went widthways, creating a grid.

I marked it up with the placements of the buttons.

Then punched a hole at each of those locations. Note there is an “up” arrow, I used this to indicate the join on the side panels. This is so I could get the positioning right on both sides—because of course this needs to be done twice!

I put the template on top of the mattress, and drew a pencil mark though the holes I had punched.

I put pins into the pencil marks so they were easy to see. This was done on both sides.

For the buttons, I sewed a couple of stitches into the back, being careful to go through the metal loop on the back. I made sure the thread was doubled up for additional strength.

I sewed though the mattress, using the pin as a guide.

And came up through the other side, using that pin as a guide.

I sewed on the other button just by going through the loop. I then sewed up and down a couple of times, making sure the buttons had tension so they created a mattress dimple.