Project 3: Yellow vintage floral dining chair

So this is a new addition to the craftypollard challenge list, a wobbly worn out dining chair. I simply couldn't resist this one! I even had the fabric in mind for the seat pad, a beautiful floral fabric I stumbled upon in a charity shop.

Let me just start by saying I thought this upcycle would be a lot quicker than it was. I hadn't expected the multiple seat coverings, which to remove meant I had to extract over 150 staples!

Step 1: Prepping

To get started I popped out the seat pad, easy enough. I inspected the joints as the chair was a little on the wobbly side. The joints at the back were coming loose so needed re-glueing. I bought some Evo-Stik interior wood adhesive and an 18" hand clamp. I prised the joints open slightly, enough to get some glue in. I spread glue around each joint before pushing them back into place. Finally i clamped the frame as tightly as I could, front to back, wiping off any excess glue and then simply left for a couple of days to set.

Step 2: Painting

I bought a sample pot of Annie Sloan Yellow which with hindsight was a bad idea as it cost a lot and was essentially just a tester pot [not very economical]. It started off really thick which would have only covered the back, so I added some water. The paint, thinned down meant that the coverage wasn't great resulting in doing around 3 coats. Stains started to appear which turned out to be areas of varnish the paint couldn't penetrate so I had to sand these down and repaint these sections {tip : probably should have sanded down to start with}.

Giving the sat pad a test run. Fabric looks good against the yellow but the seat pad won't fit in properly. I'll move onto that later.

Due to the wear and tear of this chair it was ideal for a distressed finish. I sanded along the edges with a fine sandpaper and also on the details to make them stand out. I brushed off the dust and then rubbed on a clear wax to seal the paint.

Step 3: Fabric

Next I moved on to the seat pad. I had intended to recover the seat pad without removing any of the fabric, however, when I tacked the new fabric in place the pad was way too bulky to fit. I used a flathead screwdriver and some pliers and started prising off the staples. Jeez it was a tough job. Counted 50 staples and that was just the underlining. The main fabric was also stapled down, 100 staples. Then there was another layer...you get the idea. My hands are sore!

All existing fabric removed and new fabric stapled into place.

Love the new vintage inspired chair. Makes it all worth it when you see the end result. I have more of this fabric so might even go the whole hog and do a set of 4....maybe. 

Voila, not too shabby!

Project 3: complete {sigh of relief}.