No Bedskirt

Dawn

It wouldn't be too hard to make your own custom cover in a fabric that goes with what's on the bed....whether it's a chenille, a faux suede, or even a cotton or linen look. Maybe a prequilted fabric is more 'it'? You can find that too, with different stitching designs: squares, diamonds, whatever. (this choice, in my opinion, has a more upholstered look because of the extra padding)

Do check my math, but here's an idea off the top of my head. If it's a queen-sized bed, I think that's 60" x 80", or two 60" sides and two 80" sides. To keep costs down, use plain sheeting fabric for the 'deck' of it and reserve the decorator fabric for just the sides that show, with plenty to wrap over the top and connect to the deck and under the bottom to be gathered with elastic for a snug fit.

Three meters of decorator fabric should do it. Purchasing 60" wide makes describing this easier:

1. preshrink fabric

2. cut fabric into 3 pieces, each of them 20" by 117". Join them at the short 20" ends to make one long strip. Fit this piece to your boxspring and sew the last of these 3 seams, cutting off the excess fabric (which can be saved to back an accent pillow if you wish) Do a seam finish to prevent fraying-a simple zig-zag will do.

3. Place this band of fabric around the boxspring edges so that it is centred, with equal parts hanging below and sticking up above. This part can be all tricky and tailored, but I'll KEEP IT SIMPLE for those who don't usually sew. Fold down the fabric at each corner of the top of the boxspring so the fabric comes up from the sides and lays flat onto the edges around the boxspring. You can sew this fold down, or just tack it temporarily with thread. Trim an old sheet so that it can be centred on the top of the boxsping and act as the decking, trimming it to overlap the decorator fabric by an inch. Pin the trimmed sheet's edges to the decorator fabric, careful not to pin it right to the boxspring fabric. Now take your pinned work over to the sewing machine and sew the sheet decking to the decorator fabric where you have pinned it together. Use a straight stich, 1/2" away from the sheet's edge. Next do a zig-zag stitch over the edge of the sheet all around, with the needle going through BOTH fabrics. Turn over to the wrong side and do a zig-zag seam finish on the edge of the decorator fabric as well.

4. Now all you have to do is add elastic to the portion of decorator fabric that gets tucked under the boxspring. Manufacturers of fitted sheets only elasticize the corners, but it's a lot easier to just elasticise the whole thing. To do this, fold the unfinished edge over by 1/4", then again by 1/2". Sew this casing all around but leave a good 3" open so that you can insert elastic. Buy elastic with good stretch so that it will go around the boxspring. To thread it through, fasten a safety pin to one end and thread it in, making sure not to pull the other end through-you want the other end of the elastic sticking out when you get all the way around. Once this is done, join the ends of the elastic with some stitches and stitch the opening in the casing shut.

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