Taking the Plunge!

When I moved into my first apartment after college (about three years ago), my parents let me rifle through their storage unit for furniture. This was the ideal solution for everyone, because they didn't want to pay for a storage unit anymore, and I didn't want to have to buy a bunch of furniture. I totally got the better end of that deal (especially since they then had to help me haul it across Texas, then haul it back when I moved back to Dallas - my parents are the best). Between that and the couches my sister gave me (she had gotten married only a few months beforehand, and they decided to keep her husband's set instead), I had a pretty sweet setup. 

There was only one problem: everything was hideous. 

Actually, that's not true. The tables, lamps, and pedestals look great, and the only thing hideous about the couches are the recent stains from where I dropped a red popsicle or fell asleep while eating. 

"I fell asleep watching the movie Amelie, and when I woke up,
I had spilled so much red wine on myself that I thought for a second I had been shot"

The two dining room chairs, however, looked terrible... and still do, in fact. They're this awful puke gold with puke green overlay that has stains on them that are probably also puke (unconfirmed). I mean, there is a reason they were out in storage. For the first year or so, I talked about replacing them, but over the past year, I've thought "why replace them when I could recover them for so much cheaper?!" 

Same story for the wingback that was in storage. Mom got it four years ago at a Second Chance sale that her company hosts. It's a flowery red color that she absolutely hates (hence why it was in storage), but it's really comfortable and amazing. I actually like the coloring, but it clashes with every single thing in my apartment, so it's time for that to go as well. 

So, for the past year, I've been planning on recovering these three chairs. I even did a test-run by recovering my bar stools, but I've been scared to take on these larger projects. I spent months stalling (and called it called "research"), but I've finally taken the plunge and bought the fabric. 


I'm really excited about the butterfly fabric that I got for the dining room chairs. I'm just worried about how easily it might stain. Well, I would be worried if not for the fact that I usually eat dinner sitting on the floor in front of my couch (I'm pretty good at being a grown-up).

I bought this from fabric.com!

However, If I'm being honest, I'm a little worried about the fabric I got for the wingback. I had planned on just doing a solid magenta with white piping, but it was pointed out to me that a solid color (especially one that isn't that dark) would show stains, wrinkles, etc. really easily. I'm sure it'll be fine, but I'm just kind of nervous. 

Also purchased from fabric.com. Less than $8 a yard! 

All the fabric should be coming in early next week. Want to take bets on how long I'll stall before actually starting the re-upholstery?

A simple re-upholstery of bar stools

Everyone wallows a bit differently. When going through a rough time, some people curl up with a pint of ice cream and a sad movie. Others prefer vacations or shopping sprees. My college roommate would sautee spinach and nap. Me? I like the very specific diversion of assembling furniture. Not building furniture, I don't know how to do that, but assembling it.

That's why when I was feeling low a while ago, I spent a great deal of time at Target perusing their home furnishings section. I ended up coming home with 3 new bookshelves (all of which I probably didn't actually need), and two of their Julia Bar and Counter Stools!

The bookshelves have actually proven to be very useful (because I have far too many books and movies) and surprisingly actually fit into both my old and new apartments (albeit after days of feng shui in each), but it's the bar stools that I really love. They're perfect height for the island in my kitchen, swivel around, and have comfy cushions. Still, though I hate to admit it, I always thought they were fairly ugly. The brownish-creamish color scheme was just not working for me. It didn't match a thing in my apartment! Granted, nothing in my apartment matched a single other thing in my apartment... but I'm working on that.

In an attempt to make the bar stools a bit more aesthetically pleasing, I finally recovered them a couple months ago!

Weirdly enough, this was yet another simple project that basically boiled down to stapling things together.


RE-UPHOLSTERING BAR STOOLS

What you'll need:

-About a yard of fabric - Actually, I bought about 6 yards of fabric at once, because I had a few different projects going on at the time, so I may be wrong about only needing about a yard of fabric. You've been warned.
-Pliers
-Screwdriver (both Flathead and Phillips)
-Scissors
-Staple gun and staples
-Hammer

How to do it:

(1) Start by using your screwdriver (Phillips, probably) to remove the cushions from the stools.

I forgot to take pictures during the process, so let's
just pretend that this was the old cushion...

When you flip over your cushion, you'll see some net/mesh-like fabric covering the bottom. I just tore this off and threw it away, never to think of it again. Others might have kept it intact to re-attach later or would have attached new netting. I didn't find that necessary.

(2) Next, remove all the staples you see. There will be a ton.

When removing the staples, I found it helpful to use a Flathead screwdriver (with a very thin tip) to dig underneath the staples and then kind of lever them up so that they were no longer against the surface. I then used pliers for the actual extraction process.

Side note: After removing all the staples from the first cushion, my wrist was really hurting me because I had used wrist muscles I had no idea I had, I guess. So for the second cushion, I wore my carpal-tunnel wrist guard (which, well, the fact that I even have a carpal-tunnel wrist guard might have also explained my wrist pain), and found that it was much easier.

The most important part of this step, though, is to watch out for spiders. I apparently had a spider living inside one of my cushions. It crawled on my arm. After I screamed and ran away, I was forced to take a long break from the project as I tried to get enough courage to go back into my living room. I'm not saying that all cushions have spiders living in them, but let's be real, all cushions totally have spiders living in them.

(3) After all of the staples are finally removed, and you are finished recovering from the traumatizing experience of having a probably harmless arachnid in your general vicinity, remove the existing fabric from the cushions.

(4) Using the old fabric as a template for the new fabric, cut out two circles from the new fabric - one for each bar stool - and be sure to give yourself an extra inch or two of fabric on the border, just in case.

Usually, people use a heavier upholstery fabric, but since I bought mine for multiple projects, I just stuck with regular cotton material. I figured that even if it did wear out, it'd be easy enough to replace again (also, non-upholstery fabric is much less expensive... assuming you're not using silk or diamond-laced gold thread or anything).

Also, after seeing this pattern, I could hardly resist.

(5) Staple away.

Once you've cut the new fabric, attaching it is just a matter of pulling it taut and stapling like a mad-man (or if you're like me, a mad-woman)! I have an electric staple gun that I got from Home Depot, and it makes this process way easier. I recommend just stapling away until you are comfortable that the fabric is secure.

Keep in mind that the staples may not end up flush with the surface of the cushion. In fact, I don't think they ever will (unless it's just that I'm doing something wrong with my staple gun specifically). I ended up using my hammer to push the staples into the stool the rest of the way.

(6) Using your screwdriver (or whatever you used in step 1), re-attach the cushions.

And there you go!

I used this project as a sort of introduction to furniture re-upholstery. Next, I'm going to attempt recovering these old dining room chairs I stole out of my parents' attic (with their permission). I'm ultimately working up to recovering an old wing-back chair and ottoman that my mom got in a garage sale.

WHILE I CRAFTED: I watched Star Trek: Voyager.