Rugs are so expensive. Especially outdoor rugs. They make such a big difference in a space, but still, spending over $150 on one that is going to get worn and faded in no time (personal experience!) is not something we want to do right now.

I’d heard about people making curtains from drop cloths, so I used a drop cloth to make a rug for our front porch. It was a really easy project; here’s how I did it:

First, lay it on the floor to iron the folds out. By the time you get back with the iron, you will also know whether or not the dog approves of the future rug. This is very important. Apparently.

Excuse the dog and iron the creases out.

Since this drop cloth was thinner than the typical one (don’t try to save like me by buying it for $8 at Big Lots instead of splurging $11 at Home Depot, it’s not worth it for this project), I decided to give it more weight by sewing both sides together.

So if you have a nice heavy drop cloth, you can probably get away with using just one, so go ahead and skip ALL of these steps except the last one. 🙂 However, I do recommend, even if you did get a thicker drop cloth, to double it and sew two together, it will be sturdier and heavier so that it lays flat and doesn’t get tossed around with the breezes.

You’ll need:

2 drop cloths (or one folded in half for a smaller rug)
Strong thread
Fabric paint or fabric markers

How to make a cheap DIY outdoor rug from a drop cloth:

Time needed: 1 hour and 30 minutes.

Here are the steps to turn a drop cloth into a rug

Sew your two drop cloths together
Don’t worry, this is really easy, just put the right sides (top) pieces of the drop cloth together, and sew straight lines up about a half-inch from the edges. Your rug will be inside-out for now. Don’t forget to leave a section open (not sewn together) about 6 inches so you can turn the rug right-side in.
Sew a top stitch along the outside
Using the hole you left when sewing, turn the rug right-side-out.
Reach inside and poke the corners out so they look good.
Then back at your sewing machine, stitch along the outside again, anywhere around 1/4 inch to 1/2 inch from the edge. This is your top stitch, which will give the rug more structure to help keep it from twisting and bunching.
Paint your new rug
I didn’t use fabric paint, just leftover wall paint we had laying around. Fabric paint would hold up to being washed better, but even our wall paint did just fine for two years.

I just doodled on it with paint. Not terribly excited about the pattern, it turned out way girlier than I was hoping, the green is hard to see, and it’s still pretty bare looking. So I plan on either adding to it or flipping it over and starting the painting from scratch on the other side. Maybe taping off sections and painting stripes?

For today anyway, here is our new, $8 drop cloth rug.

Next will be refinishing the bistro set, repainting the urns and planting flowers, and adding accessories. And power washing if the sun ever decides to come out again.

Update: The rug has since been updated (still not finished, but much prettier than this version), you can see it here.

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