Sewing a Travel Pillowcase with Handle

I have an amazing pillow. (I know your next question is What kind of pillow is it? It’s a Coop shredded memory foam pillow. And yeah, for ~$60, it better be amazing.) It has a fatal flaw though: it’s a king size pillow. So when you book a flight to see Mom and decide to go the minimal route and shove everything in a carry-on, a king size pillow gets bumped off the list pretty early.

But I want my pillow, for sleep is one of the great loves of my life. So I found this itty bitty travel size version. And when traveling, what’s better than having a handle on a thing?

Enter the pillowcase with added handle. I mushed together a few things I’ve already done to come up with this:

• a pillowcase
• an invisible zipper
• a handle (inspired by my floppy ski bag)

The How To

1. I ordered the pillow.
2. I measured the pillow. It’s 14.5″ x 20″. I added a 0.5″ seam allowance around all edges.
3. I cut my fabric. (Used the last bit of one of my favorite prints.)
   • 21″ x 15.5″ (x2) for the pillow case
   • 15″ x 3″ (x2) for the handle
4. I sewed the handle pieces right sides together, left a gap, turned right side out, and edge stitched all around, then set that aside.
5. I attached the invisible zip to one short end.
6. I folded the handle in half and basted the ends of it in place along the right side short edge of one of the case pieces, making sure that the handle was turned inward so it would be hanging off the outside of the case when turned right side out.
7. Making sure the zipper was left half open, I sewed the 3 remaining edges of the case right sides together, catching the ends of the handle in between the 2 case pieces.
8. Turned the whole thing right side out through the zipper.
9. Added pillow.
10. Zipped close.

And thus, my head was happy while sleeping at Mom’s.

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