Upcycle old jeans into a great Denim pocket organizer

My son needed a handy storage organiser for little things. He wanted somewhere close to hand to store his headphones, watches and other small personal items. I designed this handy denim pocket organiser to hang above his bed. What better place than a pocket to store those personal things you want close at hand!

I keep all the family’s old jeans to upcycle and repurpose. I just love working with old denim, I love the different shades of indigo and the different styles.

The denim pocket organiser is one upcycled jeans project which really shows off all the different colours and styles of jeans. The organiser also looks pretty cool on the wall. To complement the rustic upcycled look of this organiser I used a wooden branch to hang it from.

Also as I used the families old jeans for this denim pocket organiser, my son actually recognised a few of the pockets from his old jeans.

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What You Need To Make a Jeans Pocket Organiser

• Lots of old jeans
• Sewing machine, with needle suitable for denim
• Scissors
• Pins
• Thread
• Wooden branch, or stick

How To Made A Denim Pocket Organiser

1. First, cut out the pockets from your jeans, don’t forget to allow for a seam edge of approx. 1cm. For this denim pocket organizer, I used 16 pockets, front, and back.

2. Lay out your pockets in 4 rows of 4, rearrange until you are happy with the design. Jeans pockets come in various shapes and sizes, don’t worry about your arrangement being a neat rectangle, you will be able to straighten up the edges later when you add a waistband border. Personally, I love the irregularities of the pockets.

3. Once you are happy with your design, pin the pockets next to each other right sides together in each row leaving a seam of about 1cm. Then using a sewing machine with a needle suitable for heavy denim work sew these pockets together. You should now have 4 rows of sewn pockets.

4. Next, pin right sides together with the top row of pockets to the second row of pockets, and the third row of pockets to the bottom row. Sew these rows together again allowing for a seam edge. Make sure all your pockets are going to be the right way up before you begin sewing as this is an easy mistake to make.

Then, pin these 2 denim pieces right sides together and sew.

5. For the next part, cut 4 whole waistbands from your jeans. Don’t cut right along the waistband edge you want to allow for a seam. I like to keep buttons and buttonholes and leather labels on the waistband as I feel these add interest to the pocket organizer.

Pin and sew these waist bands round the four edges of your organiser in such away that it evens up the edges. If you are struggling to straighten up your edges due to pocket irregularities you can always make small denim patches to even up your organiser, (these just add character to the project).

6. Next, to make the denim loops you will need to cut more waistbands from your jeans. This time I cut the waistband right to the seam edge of each band. You will need six strips of close-cut waistband approximately 20 cm in length.

7. Fold these loops in half pin along the back of the top band of the organizer. One loop at each end of the organizer and the remainder four evenly spaced in between.

Sew these loops in place. Due to the multiple layers of denim, your sewing machine may struggle with sewing these loops in place. If this is the case then just sew them by hand, this shouldn’t take long to do.

7. Finally, cut a wooden branch so that it is at least 20cm longer than the top of your pocket organizer. Thread the branch through the hoops and hang. I used two hooks in the wall to rest the branch on.

All that is left to do is to fill the pockets of the denim pocket organiser with all your favourite little things.

 

I just love the rugged look of this denim pocket organiser and the fact that it is made from the families old jeans. It is really useful my son loves using the pockets for all his little bits and pieces.

I loved this pocket organiser I made another one with 25 pockets and numbers stenciled on the pockets to use as a handmade advent calendar. The best thing about this version of a denim pocket organiser is that it is no-sew.

Yield: Denim Pocket Organizer

Denim Pocket Wall Organiser

Print

A handy pocket wall organiser for storage of small personal items!

Prep Time 1 hour

Active Time 2 hours

Total Time 3 hours

Materials

• Old jeans 4 to 5 pairs
• Branch

Tools

• Sewing Machine
• Scissors

Instructions

1. Cut out 16 pockets from the jeans, front and back pockets.
2. Arrange them into 4 rows of 4.
3. Sew the pockets in each row together
4. Sew the rows to each other
5. Edge the pocket organiser with denim waistbands
6. Make hanging loops from waistbands and sew to the top of the organiser
7. Hang the pocket organiser from a branch using the loops

There are so many other ways you can repurpose jeans in your home decor. Don’t forget to check out my denim page.

• DIY Storage Box Using Denim
• Waistband Denim Rug
• Denim Hanging Mason Jar Vase
• Denim Handmade Dog Toys