DIY Upholstered Headboard

This is part 3 of a series of posts on creating my DIY bed. Find the home post here, the first post on the footboard creation here and the post on the headboard frame here. Now we start upholstering the headboard:

photo credit to Katie Marie at KMB Photography.

First things first you will need is upholstery buttons. I got mine from Fabricland, it took me an afternoon to cover them all but it wasn’t hard. Just follow the instructions on the packet, its really quite simple.

Now – foam. I used thin foam mattresses that I found at Wal-Mart. 1 Queen size and 1 twin size (total cost $25 CAD). Lay that over the headboard frame and staple it into place. Pull it nice and tight! (Sorry no photos of this, I was too excited.)

Next, I put a old plain white sheet on the foam. My linen was really light colour and I’d rather have white show through than the weird foam colour. This actually also helped when it came to smoothing out the linen, since it’s a weave it was a little bumpy in certain areas and would cling to the foam. MORE STAPLES!

The Pinterest tutorial I read by Homemade by Carmona didn’t have you staple the fabric down at this point. I started to do it her way, but it was really frustrating and my sanity was not worth it. I think the main difference was the type of fabricAfter the fabric was mostly secure it was time to sew on the buttons. Each button started out with dental floss tied tightly to a old button I had inherited from my mom.

Put your needle through the drilled hole on the back of the frame.

Mine needed a little extra push, a thimble worked perfect.My needle wasn’t terribly long so I also needed the assistance of some needle nose plyers to pull the needle through. Once the needle is through I clipped the floss so that I had two loose pieces sticking out, like this: Tie the button on to the loose pieces. REALLY REALLY tight. I made this a two man job. One to push the button in and one to pull the floss tight. I got some little blisters from pulling on the floss. It was worth it!

Do a bunch of those, and then trim and tuck the floss underneath each button. Repeat until all your buttons are on.I put a plain white sheet on the back of the headboard. So that nothing would scratch the wall, and done!