DIY Fur Pillow - How to Sew with Faux Fur for your living room!

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A DIY fur pillow adds a little winter coziness to your home and is super easy to make even if you’re a beginner. You can also check out my DIY pom pom pillow instructions for another cozy favorite. This post contains affiliate links.

Throw pillows are ridiculously easy to sew and a fantastic way to personalize your home.

The trick to making really interesting ones without crazy skills is to focus on texture – something I always like to do when designing.

I even buy my ready-made throw pillows with texture in mind!

A while ago, I got this faux mongolian fur to update a couple of stools for my craft room. A little bit took me a long way, but I did have a good sized piece left over to do something with!

At the time I made this DIY fur pillow, Y was two and obsessed with anything cozy. My sister in law had a shag pillow in her house and any time we went there, he’d run to the couch, bury his face in the pillow and yell “cozy!!”

So I decided I needed to use this fabric to match my couch – which as you can see, just begs to be piled high with pillows.

And when I was done, Y just stole it right off…

For the record – this is not the cheapest fabric BUT with one yard of this I made the following:

Once you break it down that way, it’s actually a great value for this type of project!

The pillow took up about half a yard total.

To make this, you don’t need a pattern. You simply cut two pieces the size you want it to be plus half an inch seam allowance in each direction.

The trick is to cut and sew the faux fur properly.

How to cut and sew faux fur:

If you simply cut across your material, you’ll find loads of half-cut hairs. You need to brush away the last layer of fur that you want intact and move it up, out of the way.

Cut the base fabric only. You can also cut using a razor blade on the back of your faux fur but I did it using a scissor.

Don’t worry about losing a few hairs at the base – it’s better than slicing mid-fur, which causes random straight ends that are just plain weird (and not in the good way).

To sew it, you also want to keep the fur strands as out of the way as possible. Once you pin your pieces together, you’ll be able to more or less see which fur strands are in the way. Sewing with a longer stitch can help you pull out strands that do get stuck in the seam more easily.

Ultimately, it won’t look bad if you have a few pieces of faux fur stuck in the seam.

Another thing to note is the direction (nap) of the fur. Your opposite sides of faux fur should be mirrored so that the fur goes in the same direction on each side.

And with that, here is your DIY fur pillow tutorial!

What you need to make a DIY fur pillow:

How to sew an easy faux fur throw pillow:

1. Lay out your faux fur piece.

Find the split between the hairs at the point you want to cut. Make a “part”. Cut it from the back, getting as few hairs caught in your scissors as possible.

2. Cut two pieces of fur in equal sizes, about half an inch bigger each way than you want your pillow to be.

3. Place both pieces fur sides facing. Make sure that the nap – direction- of the fur is mirrored and both face the same way. Brush your fur out of the way of the seam.

4. Pin the two sides together.

5. I recommend using a walking foot (which I did not do, but you should 😉 ) and a strong needle. If you don’t you’ll probably break a few like I did… Sew straight across three sides using a long stitch.

The cool thing about sewing faux fur is that your stitch doesn’t really need to be that straight as it’s very hidden and forgiving.

6. Flip your pillow the right way and use a pin or needle to pull any caught hairs out of the seams.

7. Fill your pillow. Now it’s time to hand-sew it shut!

8. Fold your corner in to look like the other rounded corners. Hand sew this side shut. I did it by folding the sides inward and stitching over the fold. Since it’s fur and it’s forgiving, you don’t need to worry about how neat it is – score!