Chair ReDo

This blog is inspired by Natalie’s blog post from today.

Finished Product

A couple summers ago, I was shopping with my mom at Sleepy Poet, a vintage/thrift/consignment store in Charlotte.  (It’s actually more like a warehouse than a store because of its massive size and multitude of sellers).  We found a set of 6 vintage French cane back chairs that we knew would fit perfectly in my kitchen – once they were repurposed.

Before

Our kitchen table is very old…it came with the beach house that my grandparents bought many years ago.  My mom helped my college roommates and I paint it black for our house, and it has stayed with Todd and I since.  We used to have chairs that matched, that were also painted black.  Todd and I replaced those with Ikea chairs after we got married, but they were just supposed to be a temporary fix.

These cane back chairs were certainly not a look that would work in my house, as they were, but we had a vision. So, I bought them and took them home, and began the lengthy process of turning them into what I had imagined.

The first step was to figure out what I wanted them to look like.  Since basically everything in our living and kitchen area is centered around black and white, I began with that look.  We decided to paint them a beige-gray with an antique finish.  For fabric, we searched Mary Jo’s, an amazing fabric store in Gastonia, NC.  We found this black and dark beige upholstery fabric with a tweed feel.  We also bought gimp, upholstery trim, in a black/gray/white color scheme.

Here is the How-To:

They were painted green/gold and had a green and gold floral pattern fabric. The cushion was basically formed to the chair, and they had a trim of gimp around the edge.

To redo them: we ripped off the gimp (it was glued – we had to use tools to help rip some of it off), then primed the chairs with Kilz (so no need for sanding) then painted and antiqued them.

We measured and cut the fabric so that we could lay it on top of the existing fabric, and used a staple gun to attach it as close to the edge as possible.  To complete the edges, we glued (fabric glue) gimp for the trim. The gimp hid the staples.

After

They took me a long time to complete, but now I am so happy that I took on this project!