After thinking about it for nearly 2 years, (covering it with blankets and laundry) we finally decided to take on reupholstering this chair over the Labour Day long weekend.

Step 1: take it all apart.

Using pliers and flat-head screwdrivers we removed the bottom seat and started working away at the fabric covered cushion. We also removed the cording and the fabric from the back of the seat.

That grey strip? That’s plastic patio furniture fabric. Dating this lovely piece of furniture a little more 70s/80s than earlier estimates of vintage family heirloom… hmmm… oh well, we kept going.

The foam wasn’t as bad as we thought it would be so we removed the fabric and cotton batting and kept the original foam (wish we’d checked this before spending $35 on foam at the fabric store!).



The mostly backless chair – this was tricky work, a zillion staples and the glue from the piping slowed us down.

We kept all the pieces for templates – we used a few.

Then, at about paint coat number six, just when we’d started to feel close to painted completion, SQUIRRELS. They couldn’t just be happy eating our tomatoes, they had to do it ALL OVER the fresh coat of paint. I was not impressed.

But, fast forward through a few more steps and we’re done! We gave it a final coat of paint after the squirrel graffiti and attached all our fabric and cording to finish it off.

100% cat approved!

What did we need?

2 meters of fabric

cording to cover staples

staple gun

pliers

flat head screwdriver

cotton batting

foam (for the back)

glue gun for the final cording

sandpaper (120 and 220)

paint

Would we do it again?

We would, but we’d do it smarter. We’d have a better idea how much fabric we needed, same goes for cotton batting and foam. And while we’d still pick the pricy fabric for the chair, we’d definitely go big box store (or check the condition of the chair’s foam) before purchasing pricy foam from the fabric store.

-A