DIY No Sew Bench Seat Cushion Using a Bed Pillow Upcycle

The antique vanity dressing table that I have been making over this week didn't have a bench or chair to match. Being a little bit of a furniture collector came in handy for this project. I pick up pieces of furniture whenever I see curbside freebies, on trash day, or whenever a family member is getting rid of things. My husband calls me a hoarder. I call it planning for the future ;) Anyway I had this old bench in my pile of project pieces and it fit perfectly under the dressing table!

Check out what this bench looks like now!

It needed a new seat obviously. Since I'm challenging myself to do this entire makeover of my daughter's room for $100, I had to get creative. Seat foam can be very expensive. I realized that this bench was about the same size as a standard bed pillow. I don't know about you, but I have a few of them that were not in good enough shape to be used for sleeping anymore. I actually had rounded up three of them and put them in a trash bag to throw out, but then my "planning for the future" side thought, maybe these will come in handy for something. And it did! This worked perfectly.

Use an old bed pillow and follow these steps for a super cheap DIY no-sew bench cushion!

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No-sew reupholstering this bench seat cushion was super easy with these steps:

1. Using hot glue (this is my hot glue gun) secure the pillow to the seat base to keep it in place. I held it down with my arm until it set.

2. I covered the pillow with a stained old hand towel to give it a little more firmness and smooth it. This could be optional depending on how firm the pillow is.

3. Cut your fabric to size and iron it. Then line it up on the seat and get it in the place you want. Then flip the whole thing over carefully. Make sure the fabric is still in the right position and straight.

4. Hot glue each of the four corners of the pillow down to the base.

5. Working your way around the seat, hot glue the fabric to the seat base. I found it looks better and more even if you start in the corners and keep your folds as symmetrical as possible on each side. Then glue down the centers of each side.

My Tip: Use something, like these scissors, to hold down the folds of fabric while the glue is hot so you don't burn your fingers. Hot glue burns are the worst!

6. Trim off any excess fabric.

7. Turn the seat base over and attach it back to the bench. In my case it already had nails that I lined back up with the nail holes and added a thick bead of hot glue for good measure.

And now you have a beautiful new DIY no sew bench or seat cushion for nearly free! I used a scrap of fabric from when I made my daughter's window seat bench about three years ago. Again, planning for the future, I keep all of my fabric scraps in a plastic bin. So mine really was nearly free, just the cost of a couple of glue sticks.