Pull out the prettiest scraps from your stash and make a fun and flirty, ruffled and reusable hot cup jacket for your morning coffee or tea. There are lots of patterns out there for this type of thing, but none with this signature touch: the ruffle! Skip that boring ol’ cardboard sleeve and wake up your cup with a custom java jacket.

Our instructions are for one jacket, but we ended up making three as we perfected the instructions. They are super fast and easy, and you can really get an assembly line going: cut-cut-cut, ruffle-ruffle-ruffle, stitch-stitch-stitch. These would be awesome for a craft fair or as an Etsy item.

Sewing Tools You Need

Sewing Machine and standard presser foot
Janome Ruffler Attachment or similar; optional

Fabric and Other Supplies

Scraps of various cotton fabrics (you need two pieces for each body, both about 12″ x 4″ and one piece for the ruffle about 2½” x 36″): we originally used our collection of scraps from Heather Bailey’ s Pop Garden & Bijoux Collection: Sway in Turquoise and Lime for the cup bodies and Tiled Primrose in Canary for all the ruffles
Scrap of lightweight batting (one piece about 12″ x 4″)
Scrap of ¾” sew-in Velcro®: approximately 1½”
All purpose thread to match fabrics
Fabric pen or pencil
Iron and ironing board
Scissors and/or rotary cutter and mat
Seam gauge
Seam ripper
Straight pins
Hand sewing needle

Getting Started and Pattern Download

Download and print the Hot Cup Pattern.
IMPORTANT: This pattern consists of ONE 8½” x 11″ sheet. You must print the PDF file at 100%. DO NOT SCALE to fit the page. Print horizontally (landscape).
Cut out each piece along the solid line and tape together at the points indicated by the arrows.
Using the assembled pattern, cut TWO pieces of patterned fabric for each cup body.
NOTE: Remember, you need to cut out your two pieces with your fabric folded either right sides together or wrong sides together. That way you end up with one front and one back. Otherwise, you could end up with two fronts or two backs that won’t match up when you place them together to sew. We like to work with wrong sides together so we can fussy cut the motifs.
Still using the assembled pattern, cut ONE piece from the lightweight batting.
From the fabric for the ruffle, cut ONE 2½” x 36″ strip.
NOTE: The length of your ruffle strip can be slightly shorter or longer. The perimeter you need to cover is approximately 23″. We wanted a shallow ruffle and so somewhat randomly decided on the 36″ length, which was about half again as long as the finished distance. If you’d like a tighter ruffle, start with a longer strip.

At Your Sewing Machine

The ends of the ruffle are finished. To do this, fold both ends of the strip right sides together and stitch, using a ¼” seam allowance.
Clip the corners.
Turn the strip right side out through the long open side and press well. Gently push out the corners if need be so they are nice and sharp. A long knitting needle, chopstick or point turner works well for this.
Gather the strip to a finished length of approximately 23″.
Rather than standard machine gathering, we used our Janome Ruffler, setting the slot to “1” and the depth screw to “1”. Why? Because we were making several prototypes so it was faster; standard gathering would work just fine as well.
Set aside your finished ruffle strip.
Find your batting piece, and machine baste it to the WRONG side of one body piece. You basting line should be approximately ¼” from the raw edge around the entire piece.
Pull apart the little chunk on Velcro®. Place the loop side (the soft side) on the right side of the tab end of the fabric/batting piece. Align it in the center of the tab end along the line of basting. Place the hook side (the scratchy side) on the right side of the remaining body piece, centered and ⅝” in from the raw edge of the straight end.
Stitch each piece of Velcro® in place around all four sides, staying very close to the edge.
NOTE: You can pin the Velcro in place or use a small Glue Dot or a piece of double-stick tape. We chose to simply hold the Velcro® in place with a fingernail until positioned under the foot. We then dropped the foot and double-checked it hadn’t moved by measuring again with a seam gauge before starting to stitch.
On the fabric/batting piece, place a pin at the top and bottom tab corner points.
Find your ruffle strip and pin it in place, starting at one pin and ending at the other.
Be careful to align the raw edges of the ruffle strip with the raw edges of the body piece. Also be careful going around the corners to keep your ruffles even.
Baste the ruffle in place with a ¼” seam allowance.
Layer the remaining body piece over the top, sandwiching the ruffle in between. Again, you need to be careful to keep the corner ruffles out of the way of the seam allowance. You can pin them out of the way.
Now using a ½” seam allowance, stitch along three sides of the jacket, leaving only the tab end open for turning.
If you used pins to hold your ruffle-corners in place, work them out before you attempt to turn the jacket right side out.
It’s a bit of a tight fit, but just get the piece started, then you can use the ruffles to help pull the jacket right side out.
Fold in the raw edges of the tab so they are flush with the edge of the Velcro. Pin, steam, and press nice and flat.
Hand stitch the opening closed with a tight ladder stitch.
The jacket will fit just perfectly around a standard takeout coffee cup.