How to Make a Stylish Pop-Up Folding Basket to Organize Your Home

Organization lovers and chaos lovers alike, today’s idea is going to delight you equally. We’re going to take a closer look at how to make a pop-up folding basket: they’re useful for everything, space-saving champions and, when made well, highly decorative.

Whether you’re more or less fond of order, more or less chaotic in the way you organize yourself… there’s something that always happens. When your home or workspace is full of objects scattered everywhere, you feel like you have less energy. Somehow, that mess on the outside spreads to the inside. Then you switch into organizatron mode, put everything away, clear the space and your energy starts flowing again. You feel at peace and more capable of doing anything.

Once you discover the wonderful world of little boxes, baskets, covers… there’s no turning back!

As you’ve probably guessed, in Lulu Ferris we have a fabulous tutorial for making a spring-frame basket or folding basket. As always, you’ll be able to see the whole process step by step, from preparing the materials to the finished result. In this tutorial we make our own version, adding a few extras such as the exterior pocket, the inner lining and an elastic band to keep it folded.

In the materials section of our online store, you’ll find the “pop-up hoops” category. There you’ll find four different hoop sizes for making the baskets. From the tiniest one, for storing sewing supplies or using as a travel wastebasket, to the largest ones, which you can use as a laundry basket or to gather up the kids’ toys.

The hoops include the pattern and spring. The small one even includes the elastic band for keeping the basket folded. But the instructions are sold separately, and the truth is that they aren’t cheap: 13.30 €. We made the tutorial precisely because it seemed a bit unfair to us that you had to buy them separately. If you subscribe to Lulu Ferris for one month, it costs just $10 USD and, in addition to access to the instructions (live and direct) for making the folding basket, you can access more than one hundred tutorials. We think it’s a much better deal, although if you only want to buy the instructions, of course that’s perfectly fine with us, too.

And what is it about this type of basket that we like so much, you may ask? Well, in short, it’s something like this:

• It makes the most of your space: The worst thing about baskets and boxes is that when you’re not using them, they become one more thing cluttering up the place. Then they start creating the very problem they’re supposed to solve. But that doesn’t happen with these baskets. Stop using one for a while? When you fold it, it practically disappears. It becomes two-dimensional, so you can tuck it anywhere.
• Multipurpose: These baskets have become very popular for laundry, for example, but you can use them for anything you can think of depending on your needs. They’re also perfect for storing the kids’ toys or your pet’s things.
• Portable: The fact that they fold up and weigh almost nothing makes them super easy to carry. We’ve seen lots of people use them as travel baskets.
• Customizable: You can do all kinds of cute things with them. Write messages with a fabric marker, sew on appliqués, add a panel of chalkboard fabric or kraft-tex handles, sew or draw little animal houses with their corresponding tails and ears, use waterproof fabric, clear plastic or Odicoat gel (if you’re going to use it for wet laundry or as a wastebasket, for example). Anything you can think of!

Besides our design, here are some other ideas we’ve seen online for making a folding basket that we liked. And remember the saying: “He who makes one basket makes a hundred.”

And if you want to discover more cute little baskets made from different materials, in different sizes and shapes, along with their corresponding tutorials, visit this post: Four solutions for organizing your home.

Paint or sew positive and funny messages on it, or add a cute appliqué

Super-cute baskets: draw or sew little animal faces

Don’t like people seeing what’s inside? Add an adjustable closure.