Chevrawesome Chair

I am thankful for Project Runway. And HGTV. And blogs. And Pinterest. And wonderful DIY videos for those of us who like to take on difficult projects. And, of course, mom's lessons on sewing.

Because reupholstering a chair is hard.

Really hard. I could have been part of a cheesy 80s sitcom. Every time I would finish a section I would foolishly say, "That was the hardest part. The next part should be easy!" It became a joke to my husband, but I was sincerely convinced each time I was right. How could it be more difficult than what I just accomplished? I sewed piping and pleats in a curve! ..Oh, that's how.

And yet, I loved it.

Sure there were moments. I put the project down for two days after I completely botched one of the side panels and had to cut new fabric and try again.

But I am often an artist and love creating and I needed a comfortable chair to curl up in to do homework and work on my son's quilt. One that went with the room and my overall color scheme for the house. So I kept marching forward, overall had fun, and ended up with a chair I am excited about.

It cost me about a third of the price a chair like that normally goes for. I found the chair itself at Goodwill for $15 and bought the fabric on sale for $55 for 9 yards. I probably only needed 7 yards to simply cover it but the chevron pattern made it necessary to (attempt to) line everything up a certain way. If I had been able to stop buying supplies there, I would have gotten the chair for a crazy low price. But I decided to save time by buying the piping.  It cost $35 by itself and is really the only wasted money in the effort (I was distracted and didn't check the price before I was at the checkout--after I'd had the store cut the section already).

So $105 for a chair that fits my sense of style. Good buy. I can be picky.

Reupholstering a Chair

Let me say now that this was a lot harder than I thought it would be. I know I've already said that and implied it repeatedly above. However, had I taken this on even three years ago, I would not have been able to successfully complete it. Even now, there are flaws in the completed version that I have decided to live with until I come up with a remedy I can feel secure won't make things worse.

I didn't actually mean to buy it. I was looking for more diningroomesque (it's totally a word) chairs with padding that I could personalize.

But then I walked into Goodwill, and there the chair was, looking at me, with its perfectly healthy structure and dingy upholstery. And its $15 price tag. I bought it and took it home and wondered if I had made a relatively cheap mistake and how I would get rid of it if I decided I had made a mistake.

Just look at that face. I couldn't leave it there.

I turned to my friend, always there for me in times of confusion: Google. I found several blogs over covering a wingback chair (this was the one I found the most useful, as well as the videos she links in this blog post--they helped me identify what I was working with when I took the chair apart).

I probably should mention that while I was all gumption and positivity and self-confidence and actively looking for a (much easier) reupholstery project, this is actually the first time I've done anything like that. My sewing experience is mostly limited to costumes for myself and my son. 

I should also mention that my brand-new old wingback chair had a surprise waiting for me: it's a recliner! I had no idea until I sat in it at home and happened to lean back.

So I jumped straight into the deep end. That's fine. Some people learn to swim that way.

The Process: It's All About the Record-Keeping

Even the tack strips were meticulously
labeled.

I like to keep records. Luckily, we live in a fantastically technological age, and so I was able to keep records by simply taking approximately a billion pictures with my phone as I took the chair apart. I am not sure I can clearly articulate how glad I was that I had taken the billion photos when I started trying to put the chair together. I can tell you that I bought the chair in late September, slowly took it apart through January (I had maybe an hour a week to devote to it, and that was not always the case), took lots of pictures, and labeled everything to an embarrassing degree (until I was putting things back together, at which point I was super relieved I obsessively labeled and took pictures).

Note the wear and tear on the head.
That's not even very far into the
removal.

Taking the chair apart was actually a learning process for me. I finally perfected the art of removing staples after almost stabbing myself with a screwdriver more times than I'd like to admit. You need a flat head screwdriver that you don't mind possibly ruining, a hammer, and pliers. The professional-grade staples that had been used to attach everything to my chair fought removal most of the time. I had to wedge the screwdriver at an angle (45 degrees or so) and hammer it into the wood just below the staple, then twist to create a gap. At which point, it was generally simple to remove the staple with pliers. 

I carefully kept all the fabric I removed from the chair and labeled, as well as the tack strips, pli-grip strips, and metal tack strips for each section so I wouldn't have to replace any of the hardware.

I learned while doing this, as many others have, that chairs are actually much less sewn than we tend to think they are. Mostly they're cobbled together with staples and other sharp implements. 

I just loosened the metal tack strips with my screwdriver.

The pli-grip strips are kind of like stapled-down carpet tacks.
You should pry them open, then carefully remove the staples.

The side panels were attached at top with a tack strip that
could curve around the arm, then pli-grip for the front curve
and metal tack strips for the top and back. Then they were
stapled to the bottom. No sewing, but lots of room for error.

I am so glad I took as many photos as I did, if only for the moral support the photos gave me whenever I doubted if I had the right approach. I simply had to follow the photos backwards to reconstruct the chair. 

Putting Things Back Together

Battened and beautiful.

If I were cool, I would have planned these images to line up.

I followed Modest Maven's and my mother's suggestion to cover the chair in quilt batting before moving on to the fabric. It did help contain the loose wool that was falling apart all over the chair, and made it feel fresher even before I put the new fabric on. I also sanded the legs and stained them a nice reddish color (Cabernet by Verathane) before putting three coats of polyurethane on them. You can see in most of the before pictures that they had been varnished and were chipping badly. I like the red tone with the light, bright teal on my finished chair.

I was fortunate in both of those endeavors: I didn't have to buy anything new. I tend to have quilt batting (it can be surprisingly handy) and we bought a bunch of sample stains before we decided how to treat our floors (most of which we didn't use) in the new house.

I also saved money where I could by using scrap fabric for sections that would not eventually see the light of day (in the picture to the right).

There's not much left to say! I used the original fabric as my pattern--luckily the manufacturer of the chair marked pleats and matched pieces by cutting nicks into the fabric, so I didn't have to figure that out myself; I simply ironed all the pieces, pinned them to my chevron material, cut and sewed and stapled. If yours is not marked, however, it will make your life much easier if you go ahead and mark fabric so you can easily align darts and pieces correctly before you sew.

I also learned that it's much easier to sew a section with piping by:

Step 2 of piping!

1. Basting the piping to one side first. I found this made it much easier for me to align the fabric because I didn't have to adjust three pieces, but only two.
2. Then basting the whole thing together. The basting made it easier for me to focus on keeping the fabric nice and straight and unwrinkled when I was ready to sew it close to the piping.
3. Finally sewing a line next to the piping. I used a zipper foot and actually sewed a little into the piping itself just to keep things as tight as possible.

And I learned how to use tack strips and metal tack strips on the back of the chair. The pli-grip was saved for the side panels, and I will tell you that, at least for me, it took some finesse.

The tack strip was used to create
a sharp line on the curve.

The metal tack strip created sharp
edges on the sides.

Just poke the spikes through...

And then you'll roll them into the
chair and hammer.

Final Thoughts

I didn't take a lot of pictures of the putting together process because I found that no matter how many blogs I'd read about wingback chairs and wingback recliners, mine was different. My guess is that manufacturers approach manufacturing in their own ways. So the big lesson here is to let your chair be your guide. Take a million pictures. Label like no one's watching. And create something you love.

I know I love mine.

I did my best to align the chevrons patter. Sometimes I was
at least a little successful.

I really love the way the chair turned out. Maybe someday I'll take
a new picture once I've removed the wallpaper in the room and
repaired and painted the wall. And added trim. And have a new table.
And move the outlet from the middle of the wall (so many things).

Last Time on Ashwood Manor: A Mother's Love

Last time, on Ashwood Manor.

Hardly had Rosemary progressed away from Reginald and returned to Lillian before Reginald felt a pressure on his arm from behind. He stiffened. Unwelcome lips brushed his ear and a too-familiar voice whispered, "Now, darling, how can we make sure you join our household if you keep scaring my daughter away?"

Reginald steeled himself before turning around, replacing his distaste with a debonair expression. "Lady Ashwood, a pleasure, as always."

"Always so adorably formal." Painted red lips curled into something more like a snarl than a smile. "So proper. I'd almost think I'd imagined our night together."

"My Lady, I assure you, as much pleasure as that evening afforded," Reginald paused here, keeping his voice low and calm, "it was something that, alas, can never be repeated. I am engaged to your daughter."

The Lady's dark eyes narrowed. "That can be arranged differently."

Before Reginald could reply, Lord Ashwood joined them. "Wife mine, do you see our handsome son-to-be? We will have the most beautiful grandchildren in Sussex."

Lady Ashwood turned her vitriol to sweetness. "Yes. He is handsome, and he will make handsome children."

To get the whole story of Ashwood Manor, the collection is here.

Last Time on Ashwood Manor: The Honourable Clarence Maugham

Last time, on Ashwood Manor.

Rosemary pretended not to notice the eyes on her as she did her best to pay attention to the conversation she and Lillian were engaged in.  Lillian was a friend, inasmuch as Rosemary had friends.  Her social superiority to nearly all those she and her parents associated with made it difficult to form bonds with others that did not include an imbalance of power, and, though she treated Lillian as an equal, underneath the giggles the girls shared was a strain on their relationship that would forever prevent Lillian from becoming a true confidant.

Feeling the gaze again, Rosemary could not help looking back and directly into the eyes of The Honourable Clarence Maugham, known only to her in name before this night.  Dark eyes--almost black--were trained on her own.  He smiled, a smile that took his dangerous eyes and transformed them into something kind and welcoming.  She smiled back, and returned her awareness to Lillian.  After all, she was not the type to pretend interest in a man when there was no option to pursue anything further.  And there was no option.

Feeling a sudden uncomfortable pressure on her elbow, the girl turned to find her fiancee.  Rosemary yanked her arm away, only to have her wrist captured with even more pressure.  "Stop that.  Let me go."

Reginald instead tightened his grasp. "Let me remind you that you are engaged to me.  You should not be flirting with strange men."

Attempting not to create a scene, Rosemary extracted her hand as gracefully as she could. "Let me remind you that you are not my husband yet. And a smile hardly counts as a flirtation."

From across the room, Clarence watched the exchange through narrowed eyes.

To get the whole story of Ashwood Manor, the collection is here.

Floor Follies

I don't think the game room floor was ever treated.

What do you do when you purchase a home that is almost entirely wood floors?  Like, around 2000 square feet of wooden floors?  What do you do when those floors have obviously been neglected, and you aren't sure some of them have ever been finished?  When even the finished floors were probably last treated when the house was built forty years ago?

Our kitchen floors.  You can see how dry
and worn they were.

Obviously you sand and stain and finish all of them in the one week before you are required to move in to your new home.  Because long-term, educated, and conscientious floor finishing is for suckers.

To be fair, it only came down to this because we had the worst luck finding someone to work on our floors--the kitchen needed some boards replaced and we wanted to get them replaced before doing all the floors--I was stood up by at least three contractors and handymen, and I called even more, before finally finding someone (thanks, Angie's List!).  By the way, I have a name if you need a handyman in Georgia.

We also don't really have money to just throw in the air, much less to either hire someone to sand and refinish 2000 square feet, or even to rent a sander for an extended period.

So we sanded the entire floor in one very, very long and exhausting day.  I have never, ever, had muscles as sore as mine were the next morning.  Everywhere.  My legs were sore.  My sides were sore.  My arms were sore.  The pads on my hands were sore.

Sanding my son's room.  Note how much
dust is being kicked into the air.

Meet Steve.

To sand the floor we rented an orbital sander.  It has a base fee (ours was per day, hence the need to finish within 24 hours), then you pay $2 for each sheet of sandpaper, and you go through around one or two per room.  Generally you start at a very low grain count, like 35, and then you pass through with a 60 count, and finally a 100 count.  Between each you need to clean the floors of the wood dust, preferably with a shop vacuum, like my new friend Steve.  Sadly, Steve has to go back to his owner, but I am a huge fan of shop vacs now.

The title of this post is no accident.  I had no idea how to sand, stain, or finish floors before I started this project.  I watched many videos, but none of them covered how to do it fast on such a large scale, and there were practically none that discussed staining.  I found tutorials for staining furniture.  So I knew to wipe on, wipe off, and that was pretty much it.

So much dust after each sanding.

I tried what I'd lucked into with my refrigerator--asking a person at Lowe's.  However, this particular Lowe's guy wasn't as helpful.  I got a vague notion of wiping on and off with lamb's wool (using a wooden applicator that made it more like mopping), bought the wool and went home, thinking that it would be no big deal to stain 2000 square feet--I mean, it'll be just like mopping, right?  Surely we'd quickly mop the stain down and back up, then apply polyurethane and in just a good 12 hours or so we'd have perfectly smooth and matching floors to enjoy.

Turns out it's nothing like mopping.  I know.  You're shocked.

If I were to take on a task like this again, this is what I'd do:
1. Make sure you have plenty of stain.  It doesn't really take that much to wipe on and off.
2. Hand-paint the stain, or use a lamb wool applicator, but only in small patches.
3. Wipe off stain with T-shirt rags (a package of 80 available at Lowe's for about $20).
4. Appreciate how much more easily I stained a floor this time.

Son's room before.

Son's room after.

However, instead, I started laying stain with my lamb wool mop, tried to wipe it off with the mop, realized that the mop got saturated really, really, really fast, paced around a bit trying to figure out what to do, remembered the aforementioned rag package, and told my husband, working in another room, that I was running to buy it.  By the time I got back, the stain had set enough I could in no way wipe any of it up.  So I got to artfully finish that room without wiping stain, but keeping it as smooth and even as I could.  It ended up at least five times as dark as I'd planned to go.

The game room floor was so transformed by
sanding it that we decided not to stain it.

On the up side, it actually is an attractive accident.  The ceiling and one wall in my son's room are wood, a light color, and this keeps it from being monotonous in there.  Just check out those before and after images!

Anyway, we ended up only staining a few rooms and leaving everything else alone to save our backs and our sanity.

Lastly, after staining, we added three coats of polyurethane to all the floors and an extra coat to floors with extra traffic.  We chose to use water-based because it doesn't yellow over time, it dries more quickly, and it doesn't have a strong smell.  We added polyurethane and Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday that week.  It was super awesome.  I got new muscles in my shoulders from the mopping motion (the only part that was like mopping).

The game room floor with polyurethane.
I'm sorry I didn't take shots of the same
part of the floor.

Some notes:
Our floors are really old.  Some of them are for sure original floors.  They have extra-worn spaces where the most traffic has been, and while they looked better when we sanded them (we thought we'd removed the darker spots), when we stained, the dark spots came right back.  So be aware that some wear and tear may not be removed.  I'm overall okay with that--I really like the sort of worn, earthy appeal of these old floors.

The house has been added onto.  So different floors are made of different types of wood.  That meant significant color differences despite the same stain.  That was another thing that influenced our decision to leave some floors alone.

Now we have a bunch of really great and really different floors.  I actually am happier with them this way than I would have been had we successfully stripped and stained them all to look the same.  Why buy a house with character and hide all of the character?

Last Time on Ashwood Manor: Rosemary's Choice

Last time, on Ashwood Manor.

Rosemary's beauty was greatly reputed and delivered on every rumor.  Clarence was not able to stop himself from staring at her, watching her across the room as she tucked a curl from her short bob behind her ear and laughed at something her girlfriend said with genuine laughter; red lips framed straight, white teeth and green eyes sparkled under dark, thick lashes and striking eyebrows.  The glitter of the beads in her very modern dress could not compete with those eyes.

Reginald noticed Clarence watching Rosemary through narrowed eyes.  Normally her many admirers barely caught his attention--they were no match for him socially or financially.  However, Clarence was the son of a Baron, and his baronage was well-known as a particularly prosperous one.  This one would be worth watching closely.  He motioned his man over and whispered in his ear.  A quick nod and knowing glance later, he had complete faith that Carl would serve him well.  The man was the best he'd ever met at opening closets and finding skeletons there.  He was even talented at placing skeletons where they did not yet exist.  No, if Clarence became a problem, Reginald would soon have all the ammunition he would need to remove the threat.

To get the whole story of Ashwood Manor, the collection is here.

Renovating a Refrigerator

My new home has beautiful granite counters.  They are black and rust.  I don't have to describe them because I can post the picture below.  Like this:

Just look at that counter--No white fridge
belongs next to such a counter.

The appliances are all stainless steel and black, so they go well with the lovely granite and look nicely modern.  I even have a double oven (double oven! It makes me giddy).

However, in the open space obviously set aside for the kitchen refrigerator, my offering was going to be this behemoth. An ugly white whale of a refrigerator. My Moby Dick.

I've been busy and haven't added the bottom
of the handles yet, so please excuse the
exposed metal.

My first response was to go shopping.  I mean, the refrigerator is in great shape and honestly runs well and offers all the amenities I generally need in a refrigerator: keeping things cold and keeping other things frozen.  It even has the added bonus amenity of a water and ice dispenser--not necessary, but nice.  But it was overwhelmingly white.  And the white color makes this particular refrigerator look dated, old, and dirty.  Especially next to my double oven (double oven!).  So the obvious response to a perfectly good but ugly refrigerator is to shop around for a new one.  I just could not bring an ugly monster into my shiny new kitchen.

After shopping for a couple of minutes (it's hard to reconcile myself to spending $800-$1500 because my perfectly fine refrigerator isn't pretty), I came to the super surprising conclusion that perhaps my refrigerator is not so ugly after all.  She just needs a makeover.  Because apparently just talking about making her over gave my refrigerator a gender.

I did some research and found that it is possible to give your appliances a makeover.  Then I talked to a nice man at Lowe's who told me that my makeover plan (a stainless steel kit) was not even sold there anymore because it didn't work.  I was momentarily disappointed, but he then not only told me that he has successfully made over a couple of appliances--including a refrigerator--but he also told me how to do it myself.

So with no further storytelling, here is how I tamed my Moby Dick and ended up with a lovely Black Beauty.

1. Figure out what you want or need in your space.  Honestly, as lovely as my refrigerator is, I have been shocked to learn how many great design options are out there, and since I have completed my makeover I've already considered several different things I could do to make my refrigerator even more attractive.  There are options!  Great colors, adding in patterns, even chalkboard paint.  A refrigerator takes up a lot of space in your kitchen--might as well make it beautiful and personal.
2. Clean your refrigerator.  I gave Betty (now she has a name AND a gender. This blog is bringing us closer) a complete cleaning inside and out.  Epoxy paint will not stick to dirty appliances.

   

   A refrigerator door without
   handles.

3. Sand, sand, sand.  I got a fine grit sandpaper, 120 grain or more, and sanded the heck out of Betty.  I sanded in circles and pretended I was training for Mr. Miyagi.  Just let some scoundrel try to come at me with a piece of sandpaper.  I sanded all of the obvious sides and the handles and plasticware.
4. Dismantle your fridge!  Surprisingly, most plastic parts of the refrigerator come off pretty easily.  I slid off the covers for the screws that held on the plastic handle, unscrewed it, slid it off, and took off the plastic hinge covers from the top of the refrigerator.  Keep a plastic bag handy to keep track of your screws and other small pieces.  Now for the part that took a leap of faith for me.  The nice man at Lowe's told me this was possible, but it just is not in my nature to just pull things off my appliances.
   
   He was right though (I shouldn't have doubted) and I was completely able to pull out the magnetic seal from both doors without doing any damage.  The seal is just wedged in, no glue.  Removing it means less taping, and that is a benefit you will appreciate with the next step.
5. I hope you like tape.  I used painter's tape to tape over the buttons on my water and ice dispenser (because painting that seemed like a bad idea),
   
   the vent at the bottom of the fridge, and all hinges and metal parts and wires I thought might need to be able to work and be flexible after I was done.  I also used a $1 shower curtain from Dollar Tree to mask over the inside of the refrigerator.  
   
   You need to paint the refrigerator while it is open to make sure the hinges continue to work and the doors can open and close without paint chipping.
6. I sprayed.  It took me seven cans of Rustoleum's Epoxy Appliance spray.  I am not very good at spray painting, however.  This was my first time, so there was a lot of learning involved.  I learned that no matter how good you think you are and how careful you think you are being, you will at least be misted by the spray.  By the end I only sprayed when dressed in all black--black leggings and black long-sleeved shirt and my hair pulled back in a ponytail.  In my head I looked just like Audrey Hepburn in Funny Face when she is dancing with the sailors. I chose not to check how accurate the image was.  

   

   I also started wearing gloves.

   Spraying is best if done slowly in layers, and I did that most of the time, though sometimes I failed completely, actually often, because I was pretty impatient and my spraying finger got tired, and switching to my thumb seemed to just make it tired too.  Also, a learning moment came when I'd let it sit and found there were some spots I perhaps had not sprayed enough--it really needs to be sprayed all at once.  Spraying some of it later only led to uneven shine.
7. Okay, so I actually paused for about a month and a half at this point.  My life got busy.  It does that.  I work full time, have a family, attend grad school online full time, and I'm in the middle of buying and renovating a home.  Busy.  This step is optional.
8. After Betty and her various accouterments dried, and after I ran all of her drawers and shelves through my dishwasher (bonus--you get a chance to REALLY clean your refrigerator during this process), I put everything back together.  I found that with a month-long break worked into this weekend project, it really helped that I'd taken a picture of the shelves and drawers before I removed them all.  I highly recommend doing the same--it makes it much easier to figure out the puzzle.  Then make adjustments to fit your lifestyle.  I added more space at the top because I like to be able to put upright containers on the top shelf.
9. I congratulated myself for being a beast.  I mean, I took apart a fridge.  Then I painted it.  Then I put it back together.  Mostly.  Still need to add the bottom sections of the handles.  But they're at the other house.  Moving is fun.

Caveat!  This is still basically just a layer of paint.  Keep a bottle of touch up paint around to fix any scrapes (as Betty got during the process of almost dropping her on me and trapping my husband when we wheeled her up some stairs to get to the kitchen).  The epoxy shouldn't flake at random, but it can be scraped off with harsh friction.

Wallpaper Woes

The wallpaper is winning.

Not only is it enmeshed into every corner of the bottom floor of the house, burrowed into every crevice and apparently always covered over with random house details that I now get to take down in order to dig the nuisance out of my walls, but it has learned to shed layers rather than be uprooted from the drywall underneath.  It is shedding layers.  Three or four layers to get even an inch of the stuff off my wall.

I must love my house very much.  Or at least my sanity.

There is some pretty wallpaper out there, stuff that is modern and fresh and clean.

I will never use it.

Once I finally get all the wallpaper off my walls I plan to live a wallpaper-free existence for the rest of my life. I don't think it's an unreasonable life goal.

This is actually an under layer of wallpaper
in the kitchen.

For the sake of posterity, and shared misery being better than misery alone, I thought I'd offer a sampling of the seven (seven!) different wallpaper patterns from the downstairs, and just for fun, I'm including the two upstairs bathroom patterns as a bonus.  Some of the wallpaper is older than the other, and there are differences in the health of the wallpaper, the application of the glue, and I'm sure other things as well that I don't know. Some came off rather easily, and led me into a false security--obviously wallpaper is not that difficult to take down.  Now I know they were just setting me up for the utter crushing disappointment of wallpaper so aged and damaged that it comes off in layers thin enough to see through.

This is the over layer in the kitchen.  This is
the evil stuff that comes off in three layers.

To remove the wallpaper I'm just using a chemical remover and this exciting looking device that pokes holes in the paper evil to let the chemical soak through and (hopefully) into the paste to release it.

This will all be worth it when I get to paint smooth, beautiful walls.

This is in the future game room.

I can believe that.

This is from the hall and what I'll call the
fireplace room.

Downstairs bathroom.

Future living room.

This was hidden under the wood
paneling in the fireplace room.

Upstairs bathroom.

The wallpaper in my son's future bathroom..

..needed more than one image.

To tell the truth I kind of like it in a vintage
older vibe kind of way. But not in my house.