Moss agate pillow

…or, experiments in home decor.

For a decade or so, I’ve been seeing Chinese jade, agate, and tourmaline-beaded pillows on the import market. Some are panels of beads sewn onto a pillow-top. Others are elaborate hollow cage structures shaped to fit the head and neck, and supported by jade or wooden end-caps.

Metaphysically-inclined folks will swear these help with headaches and other ailments. At the very least, the coolness of the gemstone is supposed to help naps on hot afternoons.

moss agate pillow

Five years ago one of my local bead suppliers had a sale on large-hole (3mm) moss agate beads. Not quite jade, but lovely (and cheap: a 16″ strand for $2.00). I had linen and cotton scraps left over from several projects, plus a lot of hemp macrame cord. My local fabric store carried foam and cotton batting pillow forms in every normal size. You can guess what happened next.

One right-angle-weave panel later, I had a 16″ x 16″ x 5″ linen and moss agate pillow that actually does make a comfortable snooze pillow. It’s pretty, and looks like a high-end decorator find. It can be hand-washed inside a pillowcase in my washing machine, not something I’d dare do to a $200 designer pillow from the usual Fancy Home Decor Store.

moss agate pillow 2

I will probably never make these to sell, because the bead supply is too chancy and expensive, and the cheaper import market means I could probably never charge the minimum $50 retail I’d ask for it. Also, I don’t want to be sewing pillows all the time.

But it’s fun knowing that my DIY skills came through well enough on the first try.

4 Comments on "Moss agate pillow"


  1. Thank you! I’m not the kind of person who can spend $50 on decorator pillows, either. I think I have about $8.50 in materials in it, and about the same in labor costs/electricity/sewing machine maintenance, etc. It was a good proof-of-concept, at least.


  2. I might be able to spend $50 on a pillow, but then it would be “too good” to actually use. (Kind of like me and designer clothes or expensive jewelry.) So I shall instead quietly admire yours.


  3. I only made it because I live in a place where temps can be 100F at night, and a cooling pillow is an advantage. That, and because I thought I could make it. Which is the usual excuse I find for doing anything new and crafty.

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