How To Cover A Box Spring (With A Hotel-Bedding-Style Detail)

This is an easy, no-sew, project for all of you who have a box spring – or a mattress foundation – and need to hide it in a sleek and modern way. So if you’re not into dust ruffles anymore or if you’re tired of fitted sheets that wrinkle up and have lost their shape, you might consider covering your box spring with a nice and sturdy material and not to mention add a little hotel-bedding-style detail!

Chose a fabric that is both a good color combination with all the elements of the room, but also something that would match most of your bedding. All my bedding has a touch of white so the choice of a white fabric seemed to be the most appropriate. To give that hotel-bedding style detail, I added a double border grosgrain ribbon that gives a clean and crisp look. The ribbon’s light beige is neutral but elegant touch.

To cover, your own box spring,

You’ll first have to calculate how much fabric to buy. There is no need to cover the headboard part, so you’ll need to add the length of the bed (x 2), plus the width of the bed and about 20 inches of  additional fabric that will be attached just on the corners of the headboard. Typically, for a king size bed you would need (80 inches x 2)  + 76 inches  + 20 inches = 256 inches or about 7.2 yards, but you will need to use only half the width of the fabric.

If your bed has a footboard, like mine, you will need less fabric as you don’t need to cover that part of the box spring. I bought only about 3 yards of fabric, divided the width in two, and cut the fabric in two to use each strip on each part of the bed.

I chose a 100% cotton that was sturdy and very similar to a duck cloth, only it was a little softer and easier to bend and work with.

To attach the fabric onto the bottom part of the box spring I used the upholstery staple. For the top part, I used generous quantities of hot glue since there was nothing solid for the stapler to attach to. I made sure that the fabric was laying nice and flat on the sides of the box spring that it would show.

Next, to attach the double border of grosgrain ribbon, I used these UGlu dashes – glue in solid form. I liked them because they didn’t create any mess and I could remove and reposition the ribbon straight, as I was going on.

I cut each square piece of these solid glue dashes in half and positioned the little rectangular stickers onto the back of the ribbon. That easy.

Do not touch the strips of glue with your hands or they’ll transform into little balls and they will show behind the ribbon. They have to be flat. The ribbons can be removed anytime or easily replaced in the future. Here, a grosgrain ribbon works better than a satin ribbon; it is sturdy and durable and its thicker and non-shiny texture is more appropriate for this project.

The before picture is nothing to be proud of,  nevertheless I needed to show you the reason I got into this box-covering-process. Up until now the box spring needed to be hidden under the duvet or a blanket.

Now, I can even tuck the coverlet under the mattress!