Cushions for Wooden Chairs

Cushion as accessories

Cushions are wonderful accessories for wooden furniture including benches, bar stools and wooden chairs. Furniture made from solid wood is hard to sit on for long periods of time and the addition of a cushion or two will ease your sore muscles. Lower lumber pain can result from not sitting properly (or sitting too long in the one position) and sometimes the addition of one or two cushions can greatly relieve the strain on your back.

Fashionable cushions accessories

Cushions can be color coordinated to match the rest of soft furnishings in your home. Cushions are functional as well as decorative so their use is not confined to the kitchen, living or dining room areas but can be utilized in bedrooms, TV rooms and conservatories too.

Kids and cushions

Young children like to hold on to a cushion when they are distressed and adults have been known to thump a cushion (it makes a great punch bag). When children start to grow they will feel the need to sit at the dining room table with the rest of the family, but often times the wooden chairs don’t allow the kids to be seated high enough relative to the table surface. The answer is to prop them up with a couple of cushions.

Wooden chairs

Wooden chair pads and covers

A handsome ornately carved wooden chair can be enhanced by the addition of a cushion. Sometimes a cushion may not stay in place on the wood chair seat

Cushion straps

Mom would stitch small braid or ribbons to the underside of the cushion to enable them to be secured (tied) to the chair legs. In this way the chair could be moved without the cushion falling off. This idea worked really well with the rocking chairs too when the cushions, it seemed, were more often on the floor as not.

Floor cushions

No chair needed

Floor cushions (called beanbags) are rather large and double up as all-in-one seating. The usual beanbag filling is lots of small polystyrene balls (bean like) which allow the cushion to take the shape of your body.

Making or refreshing your own cushions

Make cushions

Make your own cushions to compliment the wooden furniture in your home and improve the room décor. Even without a pattern you can sew up a regular square cushion on the sewing machine in just a matter of minutes. Instead of making the cushions from scratch you can give tired cushions a boost too by the addition of bows, lace, fringes, piping or braid.

Pin cushions

You will need somewhere for your pins and needles and can use a nice mini pin cushion. You can also make these from left over scraps of material if you make your own cushions.

Zipped cushions and covers

The zip is fitted into the side seam of the cushion and once the cushion pad is removed from the cushion the cover can then be washed and cleaned. Most of the newer materials are shrink proof so machine washing is ok but do take care to read the manufacturer’s instructions before washing your cushion covers. When washing (or cleaning) is completed the cushions are easily reassembled and zipped up for use again.

Window seat cushions

A window seat cushion is made specifically to suit windows styles from long ago where people sat by the window side. The window seats were often referred to as box seats and they were usually large (and deep) and could accommodate two sitting people quite easily.

Cushion embroidery, piping and bows

Chair cushions with bows

Piping is a nice addition to a cushion because it gives the cushion a well defined edge to enhance its prettyiness. The color of the piping will match or contrast the patterned fabric (or bow) used for making the cushion. Apart from initial there are many embroidery stitches and patterns (flowers, birds and leaves are popular) that you can employ on cushion covers.

Ornamental cushion bows

Ornamental bows are fashionable on cushions particularly in bedroom settings where the use of cushions is becoming more popular. The size of the bow must be appropriate to the cushion size. If you are unsure about adding bows then cut out the bow shape in paper first to measure the effect it will have on the cushion. Silk is the fabric most often used for bows but too much embellishment will affect the functionality of your cushions, making them too ‘good’ to sit on.