If you follow my blog, you probably have noticed that I have a few crafting obsessions such as denim, maps and Marimekko. It is because of my Marimekko obsession that I designed and made these DIY flower pillows.

For those who don’t know, Marimekko is a Finish textile, homewares and fashion design company. They are famed for their bold, colourful, simple prints.

One of the company’s most iconic prints is the Unikko (poppy). The Unikko poppy floral was designed in 1964 and came in fabulous colourways. The print is still very prominent with Marimekko products today and is my favourite.

I have an impressive collection of Marimekko Unikko paper napkins.

Free Pattern For Fun DIY Flower Pillows

My love of the Unikko pattern led me to wallpaper my stairs in the print. I love the simple squashed poppy design. It inspired me to make these DIY flower pillows. The pillows were designed to look like the Unikko squashed poppies.

This is a simple, fun, whimsical sewing craft. The pillows remind me of some I made as a child.

When I was 12 years old, I took a sewing class. Whilst everyone else was busy doing sensible things like learning to hem skirts, I made pillows/cushions that looked like fried eggs.

For some reason, I thought fried egg pillows would look cool. I haven’t changed; I still don’t know what’s cool! And these DIY flower pillows don’t look dissimilar to those fried eggs. Except, of course, you don’t get pink fried eggs.

These Marimekko pillows were all made by hand-sewing. You can sew the pillows up on a machine to speed things up. However, it didn’t take that long to hand-stitch the pillows. I enjoyed the slow crafting whilst watching Wimbledon on the telly.

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What You Need To Make DIY Marimekko Flower Pillows

• Fabric in the colourways of your choice. For the DIY flowers, I wanted to make them in a pink colourway, similar to these Marimekko napkins. I used soft baby cord fabric, which is relatively cheap (on eBay) and comes in many colours. You need less than half a meter of material for the main body of the pillow and then scrap pieces for the centre of the flower.

• Cotton threads match the fabric colours.
• Small piece of thin quilter wadding/batting.
• Fabric glue
• Pins, needles and thread
• DIY flower pillows pattern (download pdf here)
• Fiberfill

How To Make DIY Flower Pillows

Step 1: Print out the DIY Flower pattern (link above). I printed the PDF pattern over two A3 sizes of paper for the cushions and then sellotaped them together. If you only have a standard A4 printer, you will need to print the pattern over four sheets of paper.

Step 2: Cut out the DIY flower pillow pattern and place it on top of the fabric. Draw around the large flower (allowing for a 1cm seam allowance) on the fabric. Then, cut out the flower shape.

Then flip over the pattern and repeat. You should now have two pieces of fabric (a back and a front) in the large poppy flower shape.

Step 3: Next, cut out the centrepieces of the flower pattern. Use them to cut out a small black centrepiece and the other in a contrasting fabric.

Step 4: For the next stage, hand-stitch the small black flower fabric to the centre of the lighter-coloured middle piece. Use a simple running stitch in a black thread so that the stitches are almost invisible.

Step 5: To give the centre of the flower pillow a raised look, cut a piece of wadding slightly smaller than the pink centrepiece. Then wrap the pink fabric around the wadding. Use fabric glue to hold it in place.

Next, hand-stitch the flower centre to the front of the pillow. Again, use cotton in the same colour as the fabric to hide the stitching.

Step 6: Finally, pin both sides of the DIY flower pillow right sides and then stitch them together. Leave a small gap for stuffing the pillow. I hand-stitched the pillow, but it can just as easily be sewn on a machine.

Turn the pillow right side out through the hole that you left. Then, stuff the pillow with fiberfill. ( I use the filling from old bed pillows for this). Finish off by sewing up the hole.

I made two of these DIY flower pillows in similar but slightly different colourways, just like the Marimekko Unikko paper napkins.

Yield: DIY flower Pillows

Marimekko Poppy Flower Pillows

Print

DIY flower pillows inspired by the Marimekko Unikko poppy design

Prep Time 30 minutes

Active Time 2 hours

Total Time 2 hours 30 minutes

Difficulty Easy

Materials

• Babycord in 3 colourways
• Needle and thread in matching colours
• Wadding
• Fabric glue
• Fiberfill

Tools

• Needle or sewing machine (can be hand sewn)
• Scissors

Instructions

1. Download, print and cut out the free pattern
2. Cut out fabric using the pattern with a seam allowance
3. Sew the black center of the poppy to the middle
4. Cut wadding to fit the center panel and cover with material
5. Sew this to the main poppy cutout
6. Stitch both sides of pillow right sides together leaving a small hole for stuffing.
7. Turn right sides out. Stuff pillow and stitch the hole closed.

Other Marimekko Ideas

If you liked this post, check out some of my other Marimekko and unique pillow designs.

• Marimekko Decoupage Bowls
• Marimekko Nordic Christmas Decorations
• Upcycled Sweater Mountain Cushion
• Repurposed Denim Fish Pillow
• Luggage Map Tag Pillows
• Upcycled Christmas Tree Pillows