A little about my undocumented process...

Here is what I was left with...or what I started with: a naked frame.

I decided that re-assembling the springs and such would be too complicated. 

By this point I had decided that trying to salvage any of the soft materials of the chair was not an option. Too gross. 

So I did come research and found many chairs where built with jute ribbon woven loosely to make the seat's foundation.

See this blog:

http://chiconashoestringdecorating.blogspot.com/2012/04/how-to-reupholster-chair-guest-post-by.html

Back in Nov 2012 I 

1. Stripped all nails, staples and fluff from the frame

2. Sanded the frame lightly

3. painted the frame lightly with "gripper" brand primer

4. Looked at it a lot, did a lot of research in books and online, and put it in the shed out back.

...where it stayed until January 2014.

I went to a swanky re-uphostery store, but they did not have any jute.

I found a stand in:

this stuff, 

buckram 4"

which feels like airplane pillows but sturdier. It is what the store used to reinforce fabric when they added embellishments like buttons to pillows and such.

At the upholstery store I bought:

1. 10 yards of the buckram "tape" above 

2. 5 feet of 2" foam

3. 6 feet of Dacron (aka poly-fill in sheet form)

4. 3 yards of flannel lining

5. flat banding (aka the pretty stuff that goes around the fabric and covers your staples)...not sure how much, was in the discount bin, and I just eyeballed it. But it was loooong.

6. dark wax (Amy Howard at home brand)

BUT 1st:

I needed to finish the frame. 

1. Many coats (at least 3) of "off white" paint--an old sample-size paint jar--I tried to do several light coats, coverage was hard, and I didn't want the wood detail gunked up.

2. Johnson's paste wax to seal the paint

3. dark wax to give it a "shabby chic" or "aged European" look

WAX

The regular paste was not too hard, but wiping it on and buffing it off is quite intense.

The fancy dark stuff was another story:

I had to BRUSH it on. Anything but a brush and it looks wrong.

Then let it dry.

Then really, really, rub to get the look I wanted.

observe:

Then I started building the chair:

This is the chair with the woven buckram and white flannel fabric over top. All stapled.

Then the foam, which I cut with a metal saw...whatever works.

I cut it too much here, so I just stuck the piece back on, 

layered it with the poly-fill sheet and then the fabric.

I used 1" foam for the arms, and 2" foam and polyfill for the back.

I stapled all of the fabric as tight as possible 

(not too tight in the case of the bottom especially around the legs),

Then hot-glued on the banding.

After painting/waxing, the assembly process took 3 days, a few hours a day.

and ta-da!!

It is by no means perfect, there is hot glue showing everywhere and the back has foam bulging out and staples showing in some places, but all in, for a first time...pretty darn good.

Also I had to touch up the paint in a few places, I rubbed it off on the arms when turning it over to work on the bottom, and the hot glue drips I had to pull off took most of the paint with them. 

I will get some more close up pictures next time!

2014!!!

It may have been a year and a half since I started on the chair, I did, in fact, finish it. TODAY.

Whoo Hoo!

I will post more about the process next time, but I am BACK!

Wednesday!

How did that happen?

With the husband out of town and a long weekend, I have not gotten very far on my upholstery project. I did remove the springs and plan to have a board cut to go in the seat. Mostly I have been removing staples. I have decided that staples are MUCH more difficult to remove than the tacks.

Right now I am going to focus on slowly and carefully removing staples and fabric, then sanding and painting the frame while I figure out how I am going to get a board cut for the seat!

Oh, and  I did take everything back to home depot...I know you were biting your nails wondering!

So, next time I post I will have some pictures of progress. Okay? Okay. Great.

Friday Update

1. Finished the painting touch-ups on the found windows.

2. Decided to retain and use the burlap that covered the bottom of the chair. It has these metal thingies that keep the springs in place, and I have decided to try and use the springs. So, I washed the burlap.

Yes, the water is actually BLACK. That is not an illusion. I rinsed and refilled the sink and soaked it for about 30 minutes. The water that was left was just an amber color. And the burlap didn't fall apart, so i put it out in the sun and am waiting for it to dry......

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As far as the actual chair upholstering....sigh. I had a twofold mission today and I failed. FAILED! Home Depot MISSION: 1.buy staple gun 2. Ingrid falls asleep in the car.

Alas, Ingrid fell asleep on the way TO Home Depot instead of the way HOME. fail. And while lugging a 33 pound, sleeping 2 year old to purchase a power staple gun, I realize I have left my wallet in the car. Really? I go to the car, I come back, Ingrid wakes up to begin screaming for candy (thank you Halloween), and I realize I do not have my Home Depot gift card that I have been waiting to use in my wallet!!!!! fail. Fail, FAIL!

Ah, but I live to fight another day. I went ahead and bought the staple gun and will return it and then re-purchase it with my gift card. Yes, I will. Just without Ingrid. I may even ask the husband to do it! Hooray for the weekend!

found windows project

This took 2 naptimes. One for sanding and cleaning, and one for painting and wood filler. If you look closely, you will see I still need to paint over the wood filler on the middle window pane.

For me, the hardest part was figuring out how to hang these.

They are heavy, so I wanted to use wall studs. I decided to let the studs dictate exactly where I hung them. The windows are hung on 5 studs. I hammered nails into the studs (one each) at and angle and then drilled corresponding, angled holes into the back of frames. This also allowed them to hang flat against the wall.

The outside frames have two holes each, and the middle frame just has one. There was a lot of measuring, and a lot of pencil lines, involved in the hanging.

But I love it!!!!

un-upholstering a found Fauteuil Chair

Found two of these babies on the side of the road on election morning. Had to make the "mommy sees gold on the side of the road" u-turn. Thank goodness for vans, right?

The seats and the arms are worn through and the fabric on the back of the chair is badly faded, but I googled re-upholstering, and it seemed pretty straight forward. Time consuming and painstaking, but straight forward.

Back view!

The bottom seemed like the easiest place to start. Following advice from the hunted interior (http://thehuntedinterior.blogspot.ca/2012/03/reinventing-bergere-tutorial.html), I grabbed my needle-nose pliers and my mini crowbar....and prepared myself for staples. Many, many staples. And I was not disappointed. BUT, there were also carpet tacks. Many, many carpet tacks. The view above is after removing the black fabric covering the bottom of the chair and beginning to pry off the carpet tacks holding the fabric on.

(It was at this point that I ran inside to find something to put over my nose and mouth. There was old, rotten fabric dust everywhere. I cannot stand the work masks, so I just grabbed a nightgown and tied it around my face like a cowgirl. It was a good call.)

These chairs have a bottom that is almost entirely upholstered! The bottom part of the fabric is a separate piece!

Which is attached to the chair with more carpet tacks! 

There were 3 sides to pry off. All with cotton batting underneath. 

Now to really get into it. I started taking the main piece of fabric off the seat of the chair. I wanted to preserve the shape, so I could use it as a pattern for the new fabric. Ugh. Carpet tacks. Many, many carpet tacks.

I was able to pull this batting off in one piece, taking its tacks with it.

Eww.

I have no idea what this green fibery stuff is...

Okay, so there is wound paper nailed all around the chair. And the nails are, like, 2 inches long. So awesome. At this point I am beginning to get frustrated. Although, I must admit, the upholstery job is excellent. 50 years old, but excellent.

So after prying the wound paper off, I closed my eyes (remember, my nose and mouth are covered) and  started to pull away the old, rotty burlap. It came away easily. 

What?! Seriously, what do I do with all these springs. I also pried away the burlap from the bottom. The springs were attached to the bottom with metal things (i have no idea what they would be called)...and I just slid the end of the spring out. 

Seriously gross.

Look at all that icky stuff on the ground.

So for today, that is where I stopped. I took the bottom piece of burlap off and left the strings, so I have a chair frame with dangly, naked springs. We'll see what we can do during naptime tomorrow!