League of Dressmakers

The League of Dressmakers is an online subscription club for the adventurous seamstress. In a connected community, members embrace courageous creativity through video lessons, garment sewalongs, inspiring textile travel documentaries, and friendships with other folks who love to sew clothes. Come be a world-saving, pin-busting, adventurous stitcher with us!

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Years ago, I designed a cushion pattern for meditation and sold it through the Craftsy pattern shop.  As of May 2020, Craftsy–which was purchased by NBC Universal and renamed Bluprint–is out of business and closing down their site.  The announcement was a disappointment and a surprise to many in the sewing community, but it made me realize how well the projects I hosted there fit into the mission of the League, which is to lead you step-by-step to better sewing.  The piping in this cushion is installed identically as in the Piping A Seam series, and can serve as a workshop for that skill!  (You’ll also find the other content I hosted at Craftsy here at the League now, including my Côte d’Azur Tote Bag pattern and my Design and Sew An A-Line Skirt class, which is rolled into the Pattern Drafting series.)

This particular design came to me while driving, and as I carried my children to and from their activities, I refined bit by bit exactly what I hoped to have and use: a cushion where the structure kept it “squared” even when I was sitting on it, but where the edges didn’t bite into my ankles and make me NOT want to use it.

This clamshell design is the result of those daydreams, and I can sincerely say that in the years since I made this, I use it A LOT and have never failed to be pleased with how well it suits the task.  I made the original in these images from a table runner I discovered in the discount bin at a local home goods store (you can read more about that in this post), and it looks almost new these days, after many, many sessions.

This project is also an excellent skill-builder if you’re working through the “Piping A Seam” video series, and makes a lovely gift!  Whether you’re someone who currently meditates–and there’s a TON of excellent research on why you may want to consider it–or simply want to have a practical exercise to apply your piping skills, this cushion is a solid afternoon sewing project that will knock it out of the park.

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