Queen Anne Reupholslipstery

Sometimes I find that I fall asleep and wake up thinking the exact same thing. Usually its something related to the mountain of laundry I have or appointments I made for the kids, but sometimes it revolves around a design idea. Once it sets, I cannot stop thinking about it. Although sometimes this is a plus because it motivates me to jump out of bed at a sprint, other times it can keep me from actually resting at night.

So last night I sat there, in the dark, thinking about the Queen Anne's chair I scored off of Craigslist. This chair came home with me in the early fall and it has sat collecting dust in our basement ever since. I had all these noble plans at first to re-upholster it and well, frankly, I was a little overwhelmed when I started taking it apart. Plus, I could not seem to find a fabric or pattern that I liked. The late last night I thought today was the day. I was going to just get after it with that old chair. I accepted that it may not work out and I also accepted that I may be pleasantly surprised. As a reminder.....

Ya....not so much, right? Initially I started removing the mauve fabric, but I realized that it provided a little extra padding. This would provide useful in that I wouldn't have to apply more batting. So on it stayed!

To begin, I grabbed the other half of the West Elm duvet (one half is now the new shower curtain) and begin to drape it over the chair to see how this was going to work. It was here that I decided that this would be reupholslipstery. Basically a cross breed between a slip cover and a reupholstered piece! This also helped so that I could get the pattern in the right spot!

Bray thought it was pretty awesome to have a chair in the middle of the kitchen.

From there I tacked in the bottom piece in order to provide a spot to pull the fabric from. This was super easy with my power shot stapler!

I rounded the fabric under for over the leg area. From here I just worked upwards and out using my stapler to secure the fabric to the wooden frame.

The arms started to become a little tricky so I really spent some time here manipulating the fabric in order to get it just right. I was determined that I would not whip out the sewing machine. After many attempts to fold it the right way, I ended up with a fold to accommodate the curve of the chair. Enter the brushed nickel upholstery tacks! (Oh and maybe a quick trip to Lowe's)

To make it work, I cut the fabric and made a square which I then tacked on with the upholstery tacks to hide the seams of the multiple sections of fabric coming together.

The ends of the arms were looking like a problematic area until I realized I could pop off the pieces at the face of the arm and cover those in fabric. This made life much easier as I could gather the fabric however I wanted as it wasn't going to be seen!

Yuck!

Yippee!!

At this point I went around and added some tacks in areas for mere cosmetics. A quick hit with an iron to work out some of the wrinkles that formed while I was working and........drum roll for the before and after shots................

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Whad'ya think peeps?? Spot on, hate it.....? Be brutally honest! I learned so much and will be able to A.) do it better next time and B.) do it faster (but not too bad for a first timer!)

I am so happy that this project only cost me $3.00 in upholstery tacks because the chair was free and we all know the history of the duvet!

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