How to Turn Tee K.O. Shirts Into DIY Pillowcases

Sure, Tee K.O. shirts are great. But have you ever considered having a Tee K.O. pillow cover? Find a new purpose for an older shirt, or create the perfect gift for a friend without trying to guess their size. That’s right, with just a bit of DIY, Jackbox is now a lifestyle brand! 

There’s more than one way to cover a pillow, but for this tutorial I’m going to show you how to make an “envelope” type pillow cover. This style is easy to take on and off for washing, easy to sew, and works perfectly with a converted t-shirt. 

You’ll need: 

• A custom t-shirt (size L or larger is easiest, for 12” or more pillow)
• A pillow form from the craft store, or an old square pillow (square is best since your in-game canvas is square, too!)
• Scissors
• Straight pins (any kind) 
• A sewing machine (much easier, though you can sew by hand)
• Thread in a similar color to your shirt 
• Some good old-fashioned moxie

Before you start, wash your shirt if you haven’t. It will be easier to work with and fresh as a daisy, too. If it’s especially wrinkled or creased, you may want to iron it on a low temperature. This is a forgiving project, but you will want it to lay as flat as possible. 

Note: Make sure to never iron over the design itself! Just turn the shirt inside out and iron from the back side.

Once your shirt is ready, do a test fit over your chosen pillow to see roughly where you’d like the design to sit. You can simply drape it over, or slip the pillow inside if you feel like giving it a fashion montage. Putting a horizontal pin at the top and bottom to mark how you’d like the design to be centered is useful, too. 

Note: You will want to put the caption higher than the very bottom of the pillow, or the curve will make it hard to read.

Next, unless you really like to live on the edge, mark where you need to cut. You can use a measuring tape or ruler and a marker, but the easiest way to do this is to use the plastic bag the pillow came in! As a bonus, you can see through it to make sure your design is positioned where you want it. Because the bag is bigger than the pillow, it has a seam allowance built in. If you’re just using measurements, make sure you’ve added to the size of the pillow so it fits. I use a ¼” seam allowance so that I don’t have to trim my seams down afterwards, but you can go larger if you’re more comfortable. Fortunately, your seam allowance doesn’t need to be super precise, and neither does your cutting. Since t-shirt fabric stretches, it’s very forgiving; and actually lays more smoothly on your pillow if it’s just a bit snug.

In this example, you can see that the bag from the larger pillow let me know this Medium shirt wasn’t quite big enough for that pillow form, so I switched to a smaller one. You have to work around the sleeves, so while you can come close and hide it in the seam, that one sleeve is cutting into the square too much.

When you’re ready to cut, lay the shirt as flat as you can. Pin your pattern in place before you cut so it doesn’t shift (yes, you can pin through the plastic). If you can’t get the shirt completely flat, you may not have totally clean, straight edges. Don’t worry about this too much. You can trim off any odd bits. 

Note: for the rest of this example, I use quilting pattern fabric, since I already had a pattern made for pillows this size. You can also use paper or scrap fabric.

If you’ve decided halfway through to just make a crop top, congratulations on finishing! If you’d still like a pillow cover, you’ve got a bit more cutting to do.

Once you’re done cutting the sides and top off your shirt so you have two square pieces, you can discard the back (unprinted) piece. You’ll be using the printed front; the bottom of the shirt where the hem is will work as the back of your cover. (If you’re using a M or smaller shirt, you may not have enough length to overlap. You can still work with these smaller shirts if that’s what you have; I simply added a hem to part of the blank shirt! You can also simply sew the front and back together with an opening to insert the pillow and hand-sew it closed, if you don’t want a removable cover.) 

The hemmed part you’ve cut off will be functioning as the opening of the envelope, but you’ll need to trim them to the same width as your shirt front. You can do this either using your pattern, or by laying the front piece over the top and carefully trimming. 

Now you’re ready to pin and sew. With your shirt design face up, lay the two hemmed pieces down, with the hems facing in towards the center. They need to overlap by about 1 inch. This is the “mouth” of your envelope. The piece aligned with the top of your shirt should be laid down first; since it’s in the middle of your ”shirt sandwich”, when it’s sewn and turned the “flap” of the envelope will be facing down, like the top of a jacket pocket. You should pin these pieces in the center as well, to keep them overlapped while you sew.

Pin your pieces together carefully. I put pins parallel to the fabric edge because it’s a bit more secure in stretchy fabric. You shouldn’t sew over pins and will need to remove them as you go.

Your sewing doesn’t have to be perfectly precise; once it’s on a pillow, it will hide most minor wobbles. 

Last, you just need to turn your sewing right side out. If you’ve used a ¼” seam allowance, you don’t need to trim it before turning; if you went ½ inch or larger, you may wish to trim down a bit for a better result once turned. If you have trouble with the corners, use the eraser end of a pencil, a pen with a cap, or a chopstick. If you want to make your pillow extra durable, you can run a zig zag stitch along the seam allowance (I used a serger because I sew a lot!). However, t-shirt fabric is pretty sturdy and doesn’t unravel, so this isn’t necessary. 

And you’re all done! Enjoy your delightful, unique new home decor!

Tee K.O. is available to play in The Jackbox Party Pack 3. Learn more about the game here!