Reupholstering A Pair Of Cast Off Chairs

I came home one day with the back of our SUV stuffed with two chairs in it. I could see my husband's face as I asked him to help me take some stuff out of the car. He wasn't thrilled. At least he didn't give me any grief. I got these chairs for free from my office.

They used to sit there all day all worn out and tattered, and I had dreams of eventually redoing them. But that was like 5 years ago. Anyway, dreams finally do come true :) And since they are not needed at my office any more, they are now a perfect fit for my home.

I have always loved the style of these chairs. The wood is so rich and knew it would pop beautifully with some white fabric. I do admit, that at one point a few years ago, I attempted to take one of them apart to see if it would be easy to reupholster, but I couldn't get it apart....at all. I thought the only way to do it would be to staple the fabric on it and then glue on some double welt cording to cover the staples and edge. I wasn't too thrilled with this idea. That's probably why it sat in my office for another couple of years :)

But I finally decided to tackle it and see what I could do. All in all, it wasn't too hard to disassemble, just a bugger to pop out the sides and back. Like a true pain in the butt. But once I realized how to do it, I just grabbed the hubs and used his muscles to help :)

As for the fabric choice, I used drapery lining. If you ever want white, cheap, not see through fabric for anything, use this stuff. It's amazing. I use it all the time for my headboards, pillows, and reupholstering projects. You can get it for about $3 a yard at Hobby Lobby. Just be careful about washing it, I'm not sure how that holds up since I haven't had to wash it yet.

For this chair, I started with the seat and just covered the seat, stapling the fabric in place on the bottom. What I realized to keep a smooth look around the curved edges is that staples are your friend. Staple as many staples you have as close together as possible.

For the sides, I traced out each piece onto the fabric.

 For each piece, I traced it twice essentially since I was going to sew a 'cover' for it. So, I lined the two pieces of fabric up, pinned them in place and then sewed around the traced edge about half an inch away on all sides. I didn't stitch up the longest side, since this would be my side to put the chair piece in the cover.

Once the piece was in the cover, I just stapled the bottom unstitched piece into the chair piece itself.

Once I got a hang of it the first time around, the other pieces were a sinch.

Then I put them back in the chair....stepping on them and jumping on them. Yes. That's how bad they didn't want to come off or go back in :) But they eventually popped back into place.

Once the pieces were in, I noticed that the fabric was grabbing in places creating wrinkles, so I just got a small flat head screw driver and tucked the fabric into the frame of the chair creating a smooth line.

And here it is!

And here it is with a cute pillow, because all chairs need some adornment ;)

I'm so glad I finally tackled these babies. Years and years in the making :) Now if I can only find a spot for them! I have a few ideas on where, I just have to decided which place for sure....and hopefully one of these places is not the basement lol. I think I have a slight chair obsession. I like to buy chairs, and then I buy more,...and more. But sadly, there are only so many places to put chairs in my house so I have a 'cast off' collection down in the basement. I like to think that they will be used eventually especially when we get the basement finished. But who knows when that will be :) So, until then I will just consider myself a chair hoarder :)

And sorry that I've been mentioning two chairs in this whole post and am only showing one...but I haven't a clue where to put even one let alone two :) That's why you are only seeing one lol