The Couch Part 3: The Finishing Touches

So after a long hiatus, it's finally time for part 3... I swear I sat down to post this at least 5 different times, each time getting called away to do something else, and in-between I had plenty late nights at work, a vacation, and an illness to keep me from posting, and in the rest of the time I was mostly sleeping. There's my reason. Not an excuse. And here is the proof:

This is the final part to the three-part custom couch cushion and cover story. The story has been pretty gripping so far; the finale you've all been waiting for is finally here. Are you ready for this?

To re-recap:

My brother, Dr. Lou Feurino, has just opened a private practice. He is a Psychiatrist, Psychotherapist, and working towards becoming an analyst as well. His practice specializes in combination treatment with talk therapy and medications, if needed, for help with problems relating to mood, anxiety, substance misuse, impulsivity, attention, interpersonal relationships, self-harm behaviors, and other issues. Dr. Feurino is trained in cognitive-behavioral, dialectic-behavioral, and psychodynamic psychotherapy, along with the use of medications and the detection of general medical problems that may mimic psychiatric disorders.

My brother needs a comfortable couch, but the cushion that came with his was THE WORST EVER, so I made him a custom and extremely comfortable cushion. I then made a wonderfully soft micro-fiber suede cushion cover. Then I went on to make a few final pieces to really make this couch the best thing ever. 

First, I made a protective plastic cover (which I like to call the Italian Furniture Protector). There is a pretty solid reason for having this cover, seeing as my brother's patients may potentially be reclined on this couch, having come in from any weather and may have wet shoes, or just shoes that have ever touched the ground and are therefore dirty-ish. This plastic only covers the foot portion of the couch and will protect the fabric against damage and untimely wear.

To make the protective cover, we picked up a yard of vinyl. I only ended up using about half. I basically just wrapped the end like a present, then tucked in the ends, pinned, and sewed. That easy. Then I matched up the other side and did the same thing. It was one of the simplest things I did for this entire project.

Here's how the plastic cover came out:

The Italian Furniture Cover

side detail of stitching on the vinyl cover

Finally, I made my brother a custom little pillow for the comfort of whomever is laying on the couch. This was made of some the leftover fiber-fill comforter fabric found in this post, as well as some of the leftover micro-fiber suede that I used for the cushion cover, and a little bit of elastic to keep it in place on the cushion.

I made the filling of the pillow with a bit of the fiber fill, sewed it up and made sure it would be comfortable to lay on. (Is that the proper version of that word? That one ALWAYS gets me. I'm pretty sure "lay" is for the physical position, while "lie" is for the act of not telling the truth. Correct me if I'm wrong.) Once the pillow itself was made, I made a rectangular cover to go over it with the blue micro-fiber suede. I made it in the simplest way, by facing right sides together, and sewing 3 sides together, sewing the corners of the 4th side together, then flipped it right-side-out. Then I inserted the pillow, and hand sewed the fourth side the rest of the way closed. Simple.

a nice little rectangular pillow

I then cut some elastic to size (the parameter of the stuffed couch with cover-on, minus a few inches to account for stretch in the elastic) and then cut a length of the blue micro-fiber suede at about the parameter and a half to allow the elastic to stretch when putting the pillow onto the couch. I made a tube out of the long narrow piece of fabric, and put the elastic inside of it, making it into the strap that will keep the pillow on the couch. I attached the strap to the pillow and then was finally done with everything. It all came out nicely.

Here's the final pillow:

pillow with elastic strap

And here are the final pictures of the couch in my brother's office. It is pretty fantastic, if I do say so myself (and it's my blog, so I do say so).

this couch looks great in my brother's office

even if you don't need psychiatric evaluation, doesn't this just make you want to
go lay down in my brother's office for a bit? I'm not sure what he charges for that.

Thanks for reading and you can expect a more timely post from me very soon!

If you, or anyone you know, would like to be in contact with Dr. Feurino, please email him at LouFeurinoMD@gmail.com.