How To Build The Ultimate Pillow Fort

How To Build A Pillow Fort -make a magical pillow fort with fairy lights and starry decorations, and even star themed snacks. Perfect for family fun or date night.

Did you ever make a pillow fort as a kid? I can remember making them with the dining room chairs, some blankets, pillows, and clothespins. My sister and I loved playing in them.  There’s something about a pillow fort that makes a child’s imagination run wild.  We used to spend hours and hours playing in forts we’d made.  Whether it was classic board games, or having a tea party, we loved them.  I’m excited to share some pillow fort ideas with you.

I thought it would be fun to make a beautiful pillow fort in the living room and spend the night enjoying it with my family.  Pillow fort building is a great DIY project, made from everyday household items. 

I set up this one up in the living room for my girls, and they loved it when they got home from school and saw it -along with my dog Oscar who thought this ultimate pillow fort was a great place for a comfy nap.

There’s different ways of building pillow forts and different pillow fort types.  This one was really quite easy to put together and it turned out so cute. I made this fort on my own and surprised my kids, but you could have them help with the pillow fort construction and that would be really fun too.

How To Make a Pillow Fort

Supplies:

• rope
• pillows
• sheets
• clothes pins or binder clips
• blankets
• star decorations

?Finding the Perfect Spot

?Begin by finding a good spot to build your fort.  When you’re building a pillow fort, you want to have enough space to relax with a good book or for a cozy slumber party, but you don’t want a fort that’s too big.  A big fort is harder to build and they don’t give the same cozy secret hideaway vibes.

Start With A Rope Ridge Pole

We built a fort with a ridge pole structure.  This is the easiest way to build a fort.  In a regular building this is a wood beam, in a tent it’s the top ridge pole, for a fort we’re using rope.  This is  the main structure of our fort.  You’re going to want to attach this rope to something that can hold a little weight. This needs to be quite sturdy, probably not a job for a sticky hook.  We tied our rope between our staircase banister and our wood blinds.  

Create Your Walls

Once the rope is secured, use sheets or blankets, and attach the top of the blanket to the rope with clothespins to create your fort building -pretty old school.  You could also use binder clips for this. Sheets or lighter blankets work best for this part of the fort, rather than heavy blankets, because they’re lighter and easier to work with.

You can use pieces of furniture to help create the wall structure to your fort.  My living room chair, ottoman, and couch arm worked well as supportive furniture for the fort walls.  You could also use some kitchen chairs, the back of the couch, or stiff pillows like seat cushions, or couch cushions.

Once the walls of our sheet fort were made I added lots of pillows and throw blankets, as well as a camp mattress covered in bed linen on the floor of the fort to make it really comfortable and cozy.  You could also use couch cushions inside as your mattress.

Then I added some woolly blankets. The hanging pendant light was already hanging in the living room so I incorporated it into the tent and it was perfect.

I also swagged some fairy lights and it helps the whole tent feel so magical.

Add Some Starry Decorations

To decorate the space I used some stars. The white star balloons were some I had already from a birthday party and they worked perfectly. I also added in a letter board with “star light star bright”, and a few disco balls.

The star garlands are draped over the top. One is wood, and the other is book page stars stitched together on the sewing machine.  The Christmas garlands and the twinkle lights were some that I already had and worked perfectly with our star theme.

Star Themed Snacks

I love a theme, and once I had the stars added to the fort, I thought it would be fun to make some star themed snacks.

I started out with some simple champagne flutes, and added some gold sanding sugar to the rim.

Just use a lemon to wet the rim and then put the sanding sugar on a saucer and dip the rim of the glass in.

I also made some really easy straws. The gold paper straws were perfect with an added book page star.  Just cut a little slit in the star and slide the straw through to attach it.  Then we filled them with a little ginger ale for the kids.

I was thinking it would be fun to watch a movie in the fort, so popcorn would be a perfect snack. I decorated some plastic cups with some star gem stickers, and some glitter washi tape.

Then I filled the cups with some white cheddar popcorn, and a few yellow candies and star sprinkles for my girls to enjoy with a little screen time in our blanket fort.

If your kids wanted to sleep in the fort, it would be a lot of fun to do a star themed breakfast. I used a star shaped cookie cutter to cut out some Nutella toast, and then added some really pretty sprinkles to one corner.

Another great option for breakfast would be pancakes, french toast, or even frozen waffles cut into star shapes too.

Family Fun or Date Night

I think our own pillow fort will be up all weekend, it’s so cozy and magical inside. This is the perfect activity to do with your kids. Enjoy some family cuddles, quality time, a movie, a couple of books, or family board games in the fort.  Any little kid or big kid could have hours of fun enjoying imaginative play in a fort like this.

It’s also the perfect spot for some quiet time on a rainy day.  How about curling up with a good book here in the perfect quiet space.  Grab some extra pillows and enjoy your own little retreat.

Or how about a romantic fort for date night? It’s a great way to watch a movie together and curl up with some heavy quilts and snacks in your own blanket fort.  Or put on some music, light some candles, and pour a few glasses of wine and enjoy date night in your fort with someone special.

With a beautiful pillow fort in your living room, life really is a party!

More Ideas

You might also like our Board Game Night post.

Also check out our Christmas Movie Night here.

You might also like our our Outdoor Movie Night post.