Sewing with Boardshort Fabric for Non-Swim Uses With Zayna

May 25, 2024

Hello again, RCF Blog readers! Zayna, from Bluestocking Sewing, here and excited to take you on another adventure with Raspberry Creek Fabrics. For today’s blog I have a simple read for you; here’s 3 ways (that have nothing to do with swimsuits!) that I have used Raspberry Creek’s boardshort fabric. 

Raspberry Creek describes their Microsueded Boardshort base in their Fabric Types guide as: “58” wide 3.8 oz polyester, woven. 50+ UPF protection. This fabric is woven with a sanded right side and a smooth, almost silky wrong side. Great for board shorts, swim trunks, hiking bottoms and jackets.” Now boardshort works great for many things including bomber jackets, pleated hiking skorts, etc. But it’s ease of ironing and well-rated UPF protection also gives it some solid use in high-sun areas so I love to use it in environments where other fabrics might be prone to sun fading. With being able to custom print so many different prints on it, the options for boardshort are endless!

For my most recent boardshort acquisition I ended up with 2 yards of this lovely CLUB floral print. The cushions for our outdoor sectional were horribly faded from being outside in constant sun for two years and didn’t offer lower-back support so I used a simple pillow design, and stuffed the boardshort pillows firm before stitching shut. Prior to writing this I decided to test out the boardshort pillows on my porch for a week through 8+ hours daily of direct sunlight and through a rainstorm. The boardshort still looks brand new, and, post-rainstorm, dried quickly. They did blow into our garden at one point and the material was easy to wipe clean and toss back on the couches. 

For my second project I used the More Me Know freebie car trash can pattern and created a car trash can to hang in my car’s passenger seat. Because my passenger seat gets lots of direct sun and the boardshort is easy to clean I figured this would be a winning combination; and so far I have been proven right! I did fail to fully empty a coffee cup before throwing out and it washed out of the boardshort easily in the sink without having to run a load of laundry. 

For my last project I decided to use the boardshort to create a tri-fold portable changing pad for my toddler. I encounter a shocking number of places with no changing spots and hate putting her on the floor or directly on grass. I used some rough measurements, velcro, the boardshort fabric and some heavy-weight craft foam and stitched out a portable changing pad I could throw in our diaper bag that would be easy to wash and resilient no matter where I had to take it out to use it!

What alternative ideas do you have for boardshort? Pop on by the RCF Facebook group and share them, I’d love to hear them!

Leave a comment

Comments will be approved before showing up.

Also in Raspberry Creek Fabrics Blog