My Pleating Heart : A Dropcloth Slipcover



Pleats. I love them. I've kept a few photos of the home of Lauren Ross {via Country Living} on file as inspiration for I don't know how long. I mean, how sweet are these?!




Though I hated home economics in high school due largely in part to the half year we spent on sewing and the "C" I was given on my sewing project {a khaki colored jumpsuit that more closely resembled some kind of prison garb, only not made nearly as well}, I know that for me to have any kind of pleated goodness in our home, I'm going to have to create them myself.

One studio project that I needed to tackle was figuring out how to pretty up this Goodwill chair. Yeah. I know. There are three other chairs like it and back a year or so ago, before I was brave enough to pull out my sewing machine, I painted the upholstery on one of them. It turned out great, but I decided I wanted a much softer look for my studio. This chair needed a skirt with pleats o'plenty.



I haven't sewn much since home economics, and it has been years since my last project. But I pulled out my dusty sewing machine

I got off to just a bit of a rocky start when the foot pedal started sparking and smoking...
this past week, oiled it properly, plugged it in, and went to work. I got off to just a bit of a rocky start when the foot pedal started sparking and smoking {which is surely never a good a thing, and it almost made me want to give up before I barely began}. I was able to disassemble the pedal, though, find the loose connection, and after hubs gave it a good going over when he returned from work, I was good to go. I started cutting out pieces on Friday night and by Saturday evening, I was finished. Seems there was much more folding, pinning, and ironing involved with this project than actual sewing!

Just to make it clear {and to explain any visible mistakes!}, I have never done anything like this before. My sewing experience has been limited to throw pillows and a couple of little girls' dresses, one of which was never completed because the zipper part befuddled me. So, you see, this was a huge undertaking for me.


Other than the inspiration photos above, I didn't have any other information to go by because all the "how to's" that I tried to read just confused me greatly. Memories of home economics flooded back, so I just winged it and did my own thing - which is what, I'm sure, got me that "C" in the first place!


My pleated slipcover is far from perfect, but considering what the chair looked like before, I think it's a great improvement!


{For those of you who are wondering about the fabric, it's just a new dropcloth that has been washed in warm water and dried to make it nice and soft.}

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