How to: Make a Printed Pillow Cover with Potato Stamps

How to Make a Printed Pillow Cover

Materials

• raw potato
• sharp knife
• paring knife
• pen
• rag
• water-based fabric paint
• something to pour your paint on
• 1 19″ x 19″ piece of fabric in a light color, ironed
• masking tape
• 1 19″ x 8″ piece of fabric, ironed (this is for the back, so it can be whatever print or colors you like)
• 1 19″ x 14″ piece of fabric, ironed (this is for the back, so it can be whatever print or colors you like)
• an 18″ square pillow form

Directions

1. Cut your potato in half using the sharp knife, making sure that your cut is as straight as possible. If you cut on a slight angle, your stamp won’t print evenly.

2. Draw your design on your potato using the pen and cut it out with the paring knife. Remember, you want to cut away the parts where you don’t want ink. So, to make my triangle stamp, I cut away everything but the triangle.

3. Blot your potato on the rag to get off any excess moisture, then spoon some fabric paint onto a plate. Lay your fabric out on a surface that you don’t mind getting painty, and use the masking tape to tape the corners down, so it won’t move while you’re stamping. Dip the stamp into the paint, blot a bit, and get stamping! I kind of wanted a little wonkiness to my pattern, but if you want a really straight, uniform design, use more masking tape to block off straight lines, so you have a guideline to follow with your stamping.

4. If you’re using more than one color like I did, just rinse the paint off of your potato and blot it dry again before switching colors.  Once you’re done stamping, let the paint dry completely before continuing on. Mine needed to try overnight, because there were some areas that were a little bit paintier than others.

5. To make your pillow cover, click here to follow my pillow sham tutorial.