I’m lucky enough to live in a 2 bedroom apartment, but because I live in San Francisco, the 2nd bedroom is tiny and has to serve as my sewing room, Adam’s office, and our guest room. To make this possible, we bought a really nice inflatable mattress that is comfortable enough that even our parents can sleep on it. Unfortunately, after we took it out of its nylon stuff sack for the first time, we have never been able to fold it back small enough to fit again. Because it hasn’t fit in a sack, it’s been shoved awkwardly from one closet to another, never staying together, and in constant risk of puncture.

I decided to sew a stuff sack for the inflatable mattress out of some gifted upholstery fabric in my stash. Not much exciting to share on the construction end – It’s a big rectangle. I serged the interior seams and rolled the top edge. The important details I added are a patch of velcro (so that I can roll the top and have it stay) and straps to carry it.

You’ll notice that I stitched the straps onto the bag for about 12″, reinforcing the top and bottom with a stitched X. This helps distribute the stress on the straps from carrying the weight of the mattress so that the straps or fabric won’t rip apart.