How to Make an Ortho Pet Bed or Refresh an Old Dog Bed

I have been searching for the perfect orthopedic pet bed for my eleven-year-old dog, Booski for about a year now. I will admit that I have high standards and I couldn’t find a bed that met my standards that was within a sane price point. Most of the ortho beds were easily over $100 and all I could think was, “For what? Foam!?”

I am assuming most of you thought the same thing and that is how you came across this blog. One night while looking at the ortho beds for Booski, I got the idea to use an old memory foam bed topper we had laying around in a closet. It could perfectly support her joints and I was throwing it out anyway, so why not use it?

So, I went out to Home Goods and found a cheap $25 pillow-style pet bed with a zipper. You must have a zipper in the pet bed for this project.

You will also need a memory foam topper of your desired thickness and size, scissors, a marker to mark out your measurements, and a tape measurer.

Once I got home with my floppy pet bed that barely had any stuffing, I measured and cut my memory foam topper to the size of the pet bed.

Then you guessed it, I shoved the memory foam inside of the pet bed. I personally had enough room in the bed I bought to add a top and bottom piece of memory foam, though this may vary from bed to bed.

I figured out you do not need a pillow-style bed either, I refreshed my other dog, Beretta’s crate pad with chunks of memory foam pieces I had left over because it was losing its loft. I was even able to refresh another pet bed which is more of a basket style. The bed just needs to have a zipper and room for more stuffing.

You could even use a regular pillow case with a zipper for small dogs if you have one laying around.

Even if I had bought the memory foam topper brand new and the new pet bed to fill with the foam, it would have been cheaper than buying an ortho pet bed online.

So, this is what I ended up with at the end! It turned into more of a mini dog mattress than a pillow at the end, but the dogs love it! It was well worth the work and it is very easy to do. If you give this a try yourself, post in the comments below! I would love to see what you come up with. Happy crafting!