Thrift Store Chair Makeover

 When I had a week off from work in February, in between working on set design for the school's musical and other art and home projects I had planned, I decided to add yet another project in to the mix.  I was out searching through thrift stores for various things we needed for props for the musical when I came across a chair for $4.99.

I spotted it when I first entered the store and debated buying it and giving it a makeover while I walked around the store looking for set props, telling myself, "You have enough to do...but it's only $5!...but you're designing sets and props for the school's musical! And making new project demos for your students! And working on that painting that's been sitting on the easel forever! And you've never recovered a seat cushion!...but it's only $5, so if you mess it up it's not a big deal!"

In the end, that price tag was pretty persuasive and I brought this chair home with me.

I really liked the back of the chair, where you could see the wood grain, and I thought that the silhouette was interesting.  The seat was terrible, though, and the legs of the chair were pretty beat up with dents, gouges, and scratches.  I put the chair in our living room and proceeded to stare at it for a couple days while I worked on making props for the musical.  I knew that I was definitely going to need to recover the seat and probably do some painting.  I debated about sanding and re-staining it, but since we're still in the grips of winter (tied with Quebec City for fifth snowiest city in the world, say what!?), I quickly eliminated that option since I couldn't do that amount of sanding inside without wreaking havoc on the apartment.  Even with some sanding, the gouges in the legs would still have been visible.  In the end, I decided that I would go with a weathered painted look on the legs and frame, but keep the back of the chair as is.

The next step was to head out to Jo-Ann's for some supplies.  I settled on an upholstery fabric with a colorful pattern that corresponds nicely to other colors that I've used in the apartment as well as the color of the wood finish (the fabric name is Waverly Mayan Medallion Adobe).  I bought enough fabric so that I could eventually cover another seat cushion if I find a second chair I'd like to re-finish, so that I can someday have a semi-matched pair of chairs (might as well while the fabric was part of a %50 off sale).  I also bought 2" green foam for the seat and batting to put in between the foam and fabric.  Lastly I grabbed more staples for my staple gun and some upholstery tacks in case I need them for the seat (more on that in a bit).  I was armed with plenty of different coupons (paper and mobile versions) as well as my trusty teacher's discount, so I did all right cost wise on supplies, especially considering that I bought enough fabric for two seat cushions.

That took care of the seat cushion, so for painting supplies I hopped on over to Home Depot.  I got a sample pot of Behr's Country Dairy, for a creamy off-white that would go with the off-white color in the fabric. I also picked up a Minwax Wood Finish Stain Marker in Early American to use to touch up a few small nicks on the chair's back.

The final supply I picked up was a Krylon Clear Polyurethane spray in a Satin finish to seal everything with at the end.  I bought that at Hobby Lobby where I had another 40% off coupon that I could use while I was picking up more supplies for the musical sets and props.

The first step of tackling the chair was to remove that lovely orange vinyl seat cushion.  There were some screws to remove on the bottom corners that were easy enough to take out so that I could pull the seat cushion off.

Once the cushion was off I could see that there were a number of upholstery tacks holding it in place.  I took a few photos to note how it was wrapped around the corners for reference before prying the tacks out with a screwdriver.  They were quite easy to pull out once they had been loosened with the screwdriver. 

With the vinyl off, I found that the inside of the seat was some kind of thick cotton that had been tacked to the wood from the inside.  It had been flattened quite a bit over the years, so I was glad that the 2" thick foam that I had bought was on the generous side.  I knew that it would be much more comfortable than the old seat.  

After prying the cotton off, I used the wood from the seat that was left to trace the shape for the seat on to the foam with a Sharpie marker.  I lined up the widest side of the wood seat with one of the flat sides of the foam so that I would only have to cut out three sides.  I used a regular pair of scissors to cut everything out.  It took a little bit of work since the foam was so thick, but really wasn't that difficult.  It wasn't a perfectly straight cut since I had to work at it with the scissors, but once the batting was wrapped around it you couldn't tell.

Once the foam was cut out, I used a hot glue gun to attach it to the wooden seat.  Then, I used the old vinyl seat cover to measure how big I needed to cut the batting.  After cutting it out, I practiced wrapping it around the foam and wood.  I also traced the batting on to my fabric for when I cut that out.  At first, I thought I would use the upholstery tacks to attach it to the seat, but it was much easier to use the staple gun.  When wrapping the seat, to get a tight and even tension I started in the middle of the top and then worked to the opposite side.  I worked out from the middle when stapling, working back and forth between the top and bottom.  I then moved to the sides and handled those in the same way before folding the corners over and stapling them pulling tightly as I stapled.  

With the batting wrapped around the foam, I took the time to make sure my fabric was lined up evenly on the seat cushion.  I didn't want it to slip when I flipped the cushion to staple everything in place, so I used several straight pins to temporarily hold the fabric in place, sticking right through in to the foam seat cushion.

I then flipped the cushion and attached everything with the staple gun in the same way that I did with the batting.  I made sure to fold the fabric so that the majority of the corner folds were hidden.  With the seat cushion pressed against the back of the chair, those fabric folds were completely hidden.  I wrapped the other corners so that the fabric folds were on the left and right and couldn't be seen if you were looking at the chair straight on.  I also used an upholstery tack nailed in to the wood at each folded corner just to be doubly sure that everything was going to stay put.  

The seat cushion looked pretty good on the chair (just set on top here, not attached to the chair frame yet)!  It was now time to tackle the back of the chair.  That part was in the best shape, but even then it still had some scratches that needed to be fixed.  

The Minwax Stain Marker that I bought was the perfect tool to fix this part.  The Early American stain color matched the current wood finish quite well.  To touch up the scratches, I dabbed the areas with the marker and then immediately wiped over it with a paper towel to pick up any extra stain.  As you can see from the photo below, it worked quite well!

The seat back was all fixed up and ready to go, so it was time to start painting.  I used newspaper and painters tape to block off the seat back.  I lightly brushed on one coat of paint, let it dry, and then did a second coat.  After the second coat of paint dried, I used some sand paper to even out any areas where brushstrokes were too noticeable and then did one more coat of paint, followed by another round of light sanding as needed.

To make the paint look weathered, I used a fine grade of sandpaper to rub paint off corners and any protruding areas, like the rounded ridges on the front chair legs.  If the paint didn't wear off in an even stripe, like below, that was fine with me because I wanted a more natural worn look.  You can also see the kinds of nicks and gouges in the wood that I was talking about.

I let the painted chair sit overnight.  In the morning, I peeled the newspaper off and then lightly scraped off paint that had bled under the tape in a few small areas.  Then I re-taped the chair back, this time using plastic bags instead of newspaper - I should have done this from the beginning, it was much easier to use the plastic shopping bags than the newspaper.  I took the chair outside (hello snow) and sprayed a light coat of the polyurethane.  The polyurethane did make the paint yellow a bit, which I wasn't happy with at first.  At the end though, it looked fine when paired back with the seat cushion.  I did one light coat of the polyurethane spray, let it dry, lightly sanded a few areas that had collected a drip, and then repeated the process.  The chair was then moved to the basement to sit for a few hours and cure.

I let the chair dry for several hours and then brought it back upstairs and flipped it upside down to screw the seat cushion back in.  The polyurethane was dry enough to be lightly handled, but still slightly tacky in a few areas so I left the chair alone for the night.  The next morning, it was completely dry and even looked like the yellowing from the polyurethane had lightened up a bit.  

In all, I'm pretty happy with how the chair turned out!  If anything, I was able to teach myself how to re-cover a seat cushion.  Now I just have to keep my eyes peeled for a second chair to go with this one. After all, I have the materials all ready to go.

Tools and Supplies that I already had:

• Staple gun
• Hammer
• Screwdriver
• Sandpaper
• Paintbrushes
• Scissors
• Sewing straight pins
• Hot glue gun and glue
• Sharpie marker

Tools and Supplies Purchased:

• Chair - $4.99
• Krylon Clear Polyurethane Spray in Satin finish - $4.19 (40% off coupon)
• Fabric for seat, 0.694 yards - $12.14 (50% off fabric sale, normally $34.99 a yard), works out to $6.07 for 1 chair
• Steel upholstery tacks - $2.29 (with 15% off coupon)
• High Density Foam for the seat, about 2" thick - $8.99 (40% off coupon)
• Batting, enough to do more than one chair - $4.97 on clearance, works out to $2.49 for 1 chair
• Sample pot of Behr Country Dairy paint - $2.94
• Minwax Wood Finish Stain Marker in Early American - $5.98
• Total Cost = $46.49 for all materials - however, I have enough left of all materials except the foam to do a second chair and then some, bringing the cost down to approximately $30 for one chair, including the price of the chair itself.

Wall Art with Vintage Rulers

From the fall of 2008 through the spring of 2009, I was in a program at the Rochester Institute of Technology to get my Masters degree for art education.  It was an intense nine months (yes, a complete Masters program in nine months!), full of classes, classroom observations, and student teaching, but all worth it.  During that time, I purchased a Keep Calm and Carry On poster off of Etsy and hung it in my room.  It was my grad school motto, my daily pep talk that I saw every morning before I went to class or student teaching.

At that time, in 2008, the Keep Calm poster was not widely known around here.  In 2013, though, the poster has officially become "a thing".  It's been spoofed a million times over and you can find it in stores like Barnes & Noble, plastered all over merchandise.  

When my husband and I first moved in to our apartment in 2009, we hung my grad school poster over the fireplace mantle.  Lately, I've been wanting to replace it with something, but could never find a piece of art that was interesting enough and still went along with our collection of letters and vintage cameras.

Then yesterday morning I had a brainstorm with my morning coffee!  As usual, I was browsing Pinterest while enjoying my coffee.  I was looking through a collection of patterns I had pinned for ideas for another project when a lightbulb went off - herringbone! I always love herringbone patterns, whether it's for brick sidewalks, wood floors, or tiles, so I thought why not try that with those old rulers I'd been saving?

You see, when you're an art teacher and an artist, people tend to offer you random things and ask if you could use them or want them to make something out of.  I usually say yes, knowing that I could use whatever it is for either my students and classroom or a project of my own at some point.  That's how I came in to possession of over eighty vintage wooden rulers.  I've been holding on to them for years, looking for something to use them for.  I have more than enough rulers in my classroom, so I had been saving the rulers to use for a project of my own.  Originally I had been thinking I might make a wreath out of them, but after seeing those pattern photos I'd saved on Pinterest I instantly knew that I wanted to use the rulers to make some new wall art to replace my Keep Calm poster.  

I went out and bought an 18"x24" canvas and a small hacksaw.  My plan was to use the rulers to create a pattern on top of the canvas, attaching them to the canvas with a hot glue gun.  I wasn't sure exactly what angle to start the pattern at, but I knew I wanted to make the rulers smaller.  I separated out a bunch of rulers (I wound up using 37 by the end of this) and cut them in half to make 6" segments.  I also went through the rulers and used a small pair of pliers to pull out any metal edges before I started cutting them, so that the metal wouldn't snag on the saw when I cut the rulers.  

I bought the hacksaw and a pack of replacement blades at Home Depot.  The saw itself was less than $5, and I wound up not needing the replacement blades.  Sawing through the rulers got a little tedious, but if you have access to a power saw then this step could go much quicker.  The cuts were straight cuts at around 6 inches, so I didn't have to measure out any angles or anything. I put a trash can under the table edge while cutting the rulers to help catch sawdust and wood fragments.  I used a pair of scissors to trim off any stray wood edges after cutting - the wood was generally soft and thin enough where the scissors cleaned up the edges just fine.

Once I had my pieces cut, it was time to figure out where on the canvas I wanted to start the pattern.  Since I was making this up as I went along, I wanted to make sure I had a pattern completely figured out so that I wouldn't have to make more ruler cuts than I needed.  I spent a little bit of time using the 6" ruler pieces and the full 12" rulers to plan out different arrangements on top of the 18"x24" canvas.

I finally decided on the arrangement you can see in the photo below.  I also had some almond colored spray paint leftover from another project, so before I started gluing the rulers down I took the canvas outside and spray-painted the top and the edges.  I didn't want any of the white gessoed surface of the canvas showing through between any gaps in the rulers, or along the outside edges since I wasn't planning on framing it.  The almond color was a safe enough neutral that blended nicely with the colors of the wooden rulers.

Now that I had the pattern figured out and the canvas painted, I plugged in my hot glue gun and started gluing down the 6" rulers, working out from the bottom left corner and then rotating the canvas to reach the other side.  As I got near the edges, I had to make some new cuts to make all of the pieces fit in to the shorter or more narrow areas.  I generally tried to glue the rulers so the fresh cut sides went towards the inside of the canvas and the naturally worn edges faced the outside edge of the canvas.  It made for a cleaner look to have the naturally aged edges of the rulers exposed.

Approximately three and a half hours after starting to cut the first ruler (I watched a few TV shows on Hulu while gluing pieces down), the new wall art was finished! Tada!  That might seem like a lot of time, but for an afternoon DIY that included all of my trial and error time figuring out a pattern, I thought that was a worthy time investment for my new living room art.  

I'm really happy with how it turned out, and think it looks great on the wall.  The cost to make this was extremely low, too.  I already had the rulers, spray paint, glue gun and glue sticks.  I spent $8.09 (used a 50% off coupon) at Michael's on a two pack of 18"x24" canvas (so approximately $4 for one canvas) and $12.48 at Home Depot for the saw and replacement blades, of which I wound up not using the replacement blades and can use the saw for future projects.  Between the Mouse sander this summer, and the saw this weekend, my collection of tools is slowly growing!  

Not too shabby for a weekend project!  

Materials:

• 18"x24" canvas
• almond spray paint for the background (optional)
• 37 12" wooden rulers, cut in half to 6" segments
• hot glue gun with replacement hot glue sticks
• small hacksaw
• scissors
• small pliers (for pulling metal edge out of rulers)
• pencil for marking cuts on the rulers

A New Mailbox

For several years I have painted mailboxes for my parents' home.  The last one I painted for them was five years ago and it was starting to show its age, so this summer I decided that they were due for a new one.  The past few mailboxes have been more illustrative, so this time I decided to go with a more graphic design inspired look for a change.

The mailbox I started with was originally a bronze color, but I primed it with a pearly white finish for the base of the design.  Once the base coat was dry, I used painters tape in varying widths to mask out the herringbone inspired pattern.  I didn't do any measuring for the pattern, just eyeballed everything for the stripes.  I wanted the color blocks to be similar in size but with enough variety to add more visual interest.

Then it was simply a matter of going through with three different shades of blue and aqua house paint (acrylic paint would work fine, too, but I had these colors on hand from a previous project) and a sponge brush to dab in the color.  I used a sponge brush instead of a normal brush so that I would have a flatter finish with the color.  I tested how a normal brush looked, but I wasn't happy with being able to see the brushstroke lines.  I did use a normal paintbrush for painting in the lettering.

The lettering was put on the mailbox out by first printing out the address using my computer (the font used was Futura).  I then flipped the printouts over, and on the back of the paper I covered where the lettering was with pencil.  If you're trying this at home, you can just hold the paper up to a light to make sure that the back is sufficiently covered with pencil to cover the letters.  Once that was done, I taped the sheet to the mailbox, with the pencil covered back against the metal and the printed lettering on top.  I then simply traced over the printed letters, and the pencil on the back of the paper transfers your tracing on to the surface of the mailbox.  It's the same concept as carbon paper.

After all of the painting was completed and all of the tape removed, I sealed everything with Rust-Oleum's Crystal Clear Enamel spray to make the paint last longer against weather elements.  Then it was just a matter of installing the hardware and the mailbox was done.  Ta-da!

Vintage Cabinet Upcycle - Part 2

My vintage cabinet is finally finished!  It's been living in my kitchen for a few weeks and it is already proving itself to be quite useful.  The first post about the beginning of the job can be found here.  The remainder of this post will explain how I finished painting and fixing up the cabinet.

Once I finished sanding enough of the old paint off of the cabinet, it was time to take apart the wheels and clean them.  There was an awful lot of old gunk built up around the wheels, so it definitely needed a thorough cleaning before I could use it in my kitchen.  It took some work with pliers to loosen the bolts, but they finally came off.  You can see a cabinet leg minus the wheel below.  I also used the Mouse sander to take a good bit of rust off that part of the wheel, though I forgot to take an "after" picture before I reassembled everything.

I brought the wheel bits and the drawer pulls inside to clean them off.  I soaked everything in a mixture of warm water and CLR to help clean a lot of the older gunk off.  All of the pieces were then individually scrubbed with a toothbrush before I rinsed and dried them.  The handles shined up nicely while still retaining some of their weathered patina, which was perfect.  I wanted them to look clean, but not like they had just come off the manufacturing line.  The wheels looked much better, and the cleaned bolts also allowed the wheels to turn much more freely once I reassembled everything.

I put the wheels back on the legs before painting the primer coat on the cabinet so that I could move it around easily when needed.  I didn't want paint to get on the newly cleaned wheels, so I covered them with aluminum foil.  The foil was much easier to mash around the wheels for proper coverage instead of trying to tape them off.  

I used a Rust-Oleum spray primer to cover all inside and outside areas of the cabinet.  The surface of the cabinet looked patchy, but was smooth and level for the primer paint.  I ended up using almost two and a half cans of primer (the one half can was left over from a previous project).  Below is a picture of the primed cabinet and the drawer.

At this point, I had to delay painting for several days to weather - I live in a second floor apartment, so I try to do projects like this either out in the garage or the driveway.  However, I wound up becoming impatient with waiting, so one day I moved the cabinet inside for painting.  I made sure to open windows and set up lots of fans so that the apartment wouldn't smell like paint.  I also covered the floors so I wouldn't drip any paint.  

For the colors, I purchased two small cans (30 fl. oz.) of Behr's Low Odor Zero VOC paint.  The darker color is Teal Zeal and the lighter color that I used for the door, drawer, and cabinet interior is Jamaica Bay.  I used a small foam roller like this one to apply the paint, which allowed me to get a nice even coat.  Two coats of paint was plenty for getting the color even.  I have a decent amount of paint leftover, but that was the plan because I want to use these colors for a few other projects as well.

I let the paint thoroughly dry for a few days (the weather was still very humid and I wanted to be very sure that the surface was dry) and then moved everything back outside so that I could apply a spray coat finish to seal everything.  The paint probably didn't need a sealant, but since I planned to use this in the kitchen I wanted to apply a sealant so that the surface could be properly cleaned when needed without damaging the color.  I used Rust-Oleum's Crystal Clear Enamel spray to coat the surface.

When the clear coat was dry, all that was left was to re-attach the hardware and the cabinet countertop.   Ta-da!  I'm quite happy with how it turned out.

The cabinet is now in my kitchen and is being put to good use.  I use it to hold recipes on the countertop while I'm cooking, and I'm working on how to best utilize it for storage.  It's currently holding my teakettle and immersion blender.

I also bought three plastic placemats for $1.99 each from Target and trimmed them to fit the drawer and the interior shelves.  I had thought about lining the drawers with contact paper, but then decided on plastic placemats because I can easily remove them for cleaning in the future when needed.  

Vintage Cabinet Upcycle - Part 1

Back at the beginning of June, I went to annual Syracuse Funky Flea outside of the Everson Museum.  For those who aren't familiar with it, the Funky Flea is a one day market that has vintage goods, work from local artists, and some excellent food from local vendors.  My main score from the Funky Flea was this vintage cabinet.  The whole thing is painted metal, has a laminate top, and legs with wheels.  I thought I could put it to use in either my kitchen or as art supply storage.  The seller wanted $35, but I offered $30 and they accepted, so I walked away happy.

The cabinet has a shelf inside the large door as well as a towel bar in the inside.  After some thinking, I've decided to use it in my kitchen because I could use an extra countertop space by the stove, and the cabinet is almost the perfect height for that.  

That also means that this metal cabinet needs a serious makeover.  For starters, can we talk about that shade of pink? Yuck!  The whole cabinet is going to get a new paint job.  The top is in good condition, and I like the knobs (which will look good as new after some cleaning), so a new paint job will go a long way in sprucing up this cabinet.

I took the cabinet out in the driveway today to start sanding off the old paint.  The tapered legs and the corners of the cabinet are in the worst shape in terms of scratches and dings.  The wheels are also kind of grungy right now (as you can see above), so I've removed those for cleaning and polishing.  I also pulled out the drawer, removed both knobs, and unscrewed and removed the laminate top as well.  

Then I broke out my Mouse sander, some 80 grit sandpaper, and a face mask.  After a bit of work, I discovered that whoever had painted this cabinet pink put the paint on really really thick.  In some places, the paint is flaking off in chunks, but in other spots it's taking a lot of work to remove it.  In fact, let's take a look at the layers of old paint on this cabinet.  It almost looks like a topographical map!

That's six layers of paint before you get to the original surface!  Crazy!  The pink paint is the toughest right now because both layers of it were put on so thick.  Originally my plan was to get down to the original surface of the cabinet before priming and re-painting, but let's be honest, ain't nobody got time for that.  After working outside sanding for several hours, I have amended my plan to just sanding off the pink layers, which are the most noticeably bumpy and pitted, and then just to make it an even enough surface before I put the primer on.  The areas where I've gotten all of the pink paint off already feel pretty smooth and level, even though you can still see different patches of color.  Once the primer is on, you won't be able to tell the difference.  

I had to stop work on the cabinet a little earlier than I would have liked due to incoming rain and thunder, but when I came back inside I decided to do a little bit of research on my vintage cabinet - and this is where I found out some interesting things! After thoroughly checking the cabinet, I wasn't able to find a manufacturing stamp or label, but I knew that the factory printed faux wood grain that I found under the paint could help point me in the right direction.  

I haven't been able to find an exact match to my cabinet, but I've found enough to estimate that it's from the 1930's to 1950's.  I'd guess around 1940 or so judging from some of the other cabinets I found online.  It was most likely part of a medical office.  The two brands I found that look the most similar in style are Simmons and Hamilton.  For example, here is a metal 1930s Simmons wheeled cabinet with a faux wood grain on Etsy - selling for $350!  I also found another online shop selling vintage medical and apothecary cabinets that are similar to mine - but the lowest starting price is $495!  I don't know if my metal cabinet is worth anything like that, but I'm willing to bet that my $30 I spent at the Funky Flea was an excellent bargain!

I'm hoping to work more on the cabinet this weekend.  I'd like to finish the last bits of sanding and then prime it so I can start painting.  Now to pick out the colors!

Part 2 of this project can be read here.