How deep buttoning works: two grids, not one
Deep buttoning looks like magic and is really just geometry done twice. There are two grids, not one, and keeping them straight in your head is most of the job. The buttons sit on a foundation grid — marked at the finished diamond size on the hessian (US: burlap), base or foam. The cover is marked on a second, larger grid, because every diamond swallows a little cloth as it folds. You pull the big grid down onto the small one, button by button, and the spare fabric becomes the pleats that run between the buttons. Get the two grids right and the folds fall into place on their own.
How to set out a diamond pattern
The diamonds come from offsetting the rows. Every second row is shifted sideways by half a diamond, and that half-step is what turns a grid of squares into a field of diamonds. The diamond width is the spacing between buttons along a row; the diamond height is the spacing between every second row — so the rows themselves sit half that distance apart. Buttoning is traditionally set out a little taller than it is wide, which is why a diamond looks like a diamond and not a square.
Whole diamonds have to fit the space. You can't have three-and-a-bit diamonds across a chair back — it has to come out even. So the calculator nudges the diamond size slightly from the figure you type until a whole number fits the buttoned area cleanly, and shows you the "actual diamond" size you'll really be marking. Add a flat border between the outer buttons and the edge, and there's your foundation grid.
How much extra fabric does deep buttoning need?
This is the part that catches everybody, and the reason more buttoned jobs are ruined by a short cover than by anything else: the fabric has to be cut much fuller than the finished panel, because it pleats inward at every single button. Skimp here and you simply run out of cloth halfway across.
The extra is called the fullness, or take-up, and you add it to every diamond, in both directions. As a starting point, allow about ½ inch per diamond for shallow buttoning, ¾ inch for medium, and 1¼ inch for deep — each way. It grows with the depth of the buttoning, the thickness of the stuffing and the stretch of the cloth; a thin cover over firm foam wants less. On top of the buttoned grid you still add a normal turning allowance all round — around 7 cm — for pulling the cover through and fixing off, and on a buttoned job it pays to be generous.
On anything that matters, button a calico (US: muslin) test panel first. Mark it, button it, and measure what you actually lose — then set the fullness to that figure, and every job after will be right first time. The numbers above get you close; your own hands and your own cloth get you exact.
A worked example
Take a chair back with a buttoned area of about 45 cm each way, medium buttoning at a ¾-inch fullness. Once whole diamonds are fitted to the space you might land on a five-button-wide layout with offset rows. The calculator counts the buttons — but more usefully it works out the larger cover grid, adding the fullness to every diamond so you know exactly how much bigger to cut and mark the cloth. Add the turning all round and that's your cutting size. Mark the small grid on the base, the big grid on the back of the cover, line up the first row, and button your way across.
Buttoning kit
- Long double-ended buttoning needle (paid link)
- Nylon buttoning twine (paid link)
- Self-cover button kit (paid link)
- Upholstery regulator (paid link)