Mar 25, 2013 by Mary Anne
Hello everyone! I have missed and neglected this poor blog of mine. We’ve had so much happening lately that I couldn’t keep up. It looks like at this season of life, I will be blogging about once or twice a week at the most.
Have I shared with you how much I love Craigslist? Well, I do! I often browse this site and before Christmas, I spotted these chairs. The owner actually acquired it in the hopes of reupholstering them himself but he just couldn’t do it. When I saw the word FREE, I happily sent my husband and his truck to pick them up for me. I love the shape of these chairs and they are so comfortable to sit on. Here they are AFTER I reupholstered them.
Here are the chairs BEFORE they were reupholstered. They were so badly mistreated but I still saw the potential. After airing the chair out and vacuuming the crevices, I started to disassemble the chair. I wanted to make sure that I saved the old (yellow) fabric so I can use it to make my pattern.
I used the following tools– flat screwdriver, old scissors, tape measurer, wooden ruler. I started from the back of the chair removing the staples as I went along. There must have been 5231 staples used to upholster this chair. My poor hands were sore. Make sure that you label your fabrics after disassembling them. I basically wrote on the old fabric the front and back and numbered them in the order I removed them. I found that in reupholstering the chairs, the last piece fabric I disassembled became the first one I put back on.
Here’s one of the chairs after all of the old fabric was taken off.
I decided to leave the old cording on the back of the chair. They were a pain to take off. I wanted to make sure that I still had my hands after this project was done.
This is what I ended up using to reupholster these chairs. I love the color, weight and durability of the canvas drop cloth. I found that the ones Home Depot sells are the best. I ended up using one, which cost me $9.99.
I washed the drop cloth to get rid of the smell and to soften the fabric. I then laid it out on the floor and cut out my patterns using the old (yellow) fabric. I allotted a little over an inch for the stapling.
Here’s the first piece to go on, the seat. It was actually the last piece I took off when I disassembled the old fabric.
THIS IS WHERE THE WARNING COMES! I am not a professional by no means at all. I simply have been doing this for fun and in the hopes of beautifying my home without spending a ton of money. I’ve reupholstered a few pieces this way and they’ve held up for years now. The key to this for me was to ensure that they are reupholstered strong. I have three super active but adorable boys after all. The areas that I was able to staple, I stapled. Note, I am using staples/stapler designed for reupholstery NOT staples/stapler that you get from Staples. The areas in the back I ended up using a hot glue gun, YES, a hot glue gun! It has worked beautifully for me in the past and I have 3 young boys who put these furniture to the test for me to prove the durability.
The front and sides I ended up stapling. Make sure that you pull the fabric taut.
Here is how it looks after the seat is on.
The next piece to go on is the front of the chair’s back. If you look at the original chair, you will notice that this area is actually divided into three pieces connected by cording but I didn’t want to go that route. I ended up doing a simple teeny pleat in place of the cording.
I proceeded to staple the fabric to the back of the chair.
Speaking of cording, here’s how I made mine. I measured the old cording that was on the chair. I’ve had this black pipe embellishment that I simply sewed inside a 1.5 inch of the same fabric.
I wasn’t able to take a picture but I attached the cording to the piece of fabric that was going to be attached to the seat of the chair. Below you’ll see that I am using pins to secure the fabric to the chair. I, again, used the combination of hot glue gun and staples to secure the fabric.
Here’s how the chair look so far after the cording is attached. Again, I forgot to take pics of this step but I stapled the remaining under the chair.
Here’s the cording being applied to the side of the chair’s back.
And finally, here is the back piece being attached on top of the cording. Remember, this is the first piece I took off when I disassembled and it’s the last to go on in reupholstering.
One down, one more to go. It took me 3 days to reupholster these 2 chairs.
And here they are all finished!
They found a new place in the sitting room.
This is obviously the part of the house that gets the most light. I just love how the chairs turned out. My boys love sitting on them and yes, they turn!
I hope this inspires you to take up a project and see what magic you can work into turning something ugly into something beautiful. Have a great Easter Sunday everyone!
Mary Anne
Linking to:
The Shabby Creek Cottage
Skip To My Lou
The 36th Avenue
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