when it comes to the quality of old versus new I couldn't agree with you more... its wonderful Pacman, looks so comfy and inviting, you've done fabulous work updating and reinvigorating a lovely piece of furniture.
really well done!

And many thanks to you Cherry ;-)

Just looked through your stuff and it is all absolutely amazing you are really talented!
I have a chair that I bought and said I would redo and and feeling inspired to have a go from looking at your stuff but a couple of questions:

The chair as the 'old' smell - obviously stored somewhere damp, perhaps for quite a while and I have steamed, left out in the air, and made a large lavender sachet to leave on it, but it still smells - any suggestions?
Do you know if the guy might still be at East wall market and if so where is that exactly?!
I had thought of covering over the existing material but by the looks of your perfect stuff, you removed (if they weren't already gone) the old covers -I am nervous of the whole structure falling apart if I do that - any advice welcome!
Measuring it/making a pattern is a huge challenge to me - not the best at the measuring!
of course removing the material might solve the first problem...
thanks for sharing
kind regards
T

Go for it Teeny!
 

Hi Teeny38,

Thanks for your kind comments. I would say to go for it. It is not an easy job but very rewarding.

All chairs need to be stripped back to the wood below and if they are going to fall apart, that bit needs to be repaired: you cannot just have material holding your chair together - it needs to be structurally sound first. You may need to polish up wood etc if it needs it.

It is crucial that you keep all the material that you take off as this will be your pattern. I wrote on the back of pieces what they were and took lots of photos. Make notes too - whatever helps to re-jog your memory on how to put it back together. Whatever comes off last, goes back on first!

They guy in East Wall Market is Kevin and he is there every weekend. All materials are €3 per meter. As you go in the front, he is on the right.

You will probably need filler for your chair too (having no idea what it looks like) but you can get a lot of supplies from Zhivago - http://www.zhivago.ie/ Sorry I took a while to reply - I was away ;-) You could always email me a pic or post it here.

Best of luck with it and don't forget, you have nothing to loose.

thanks so much, that's brill advice. I will have a go - and keep you posted.
thanks again.
Teeny

Girls dresser
 

Just to show what a lick of paint can do: I used chalk paint and waxed after.

That looks terrific!

can you tell me what the point of waxing an item that has been repainted?
Ive read most things that are repainted are being waxed, but dont know why that is...
Thank you!

Waxing
 

Hi AONB,

Sorry about the delay: I don't check this all the time.

Regarding your question about waxing an item, it would depend on the job you have done and the finish you want. You could just use a satinwood paint straight onto wood and that is made to be a durable finish so you don't require any more protection for your piece.

On the item above I did a chalk paint effect on the piece and that would come off fairly quickly with wear and tear if I did not use a few layers of wax. The wax will protect the paint and made the chalking more durable. I am going to post pics now of another piece that I waxed and that waxing was to protect the wood.

Hope that helps ;-)

Cleaning up untreated wood
 

This chair was made by my son-in-law who asked me to finish it off for him. It is a lovely chair and very well made but had been left outside in a shed for years without being treated with anything.

It took many hours of sanding it down as there were a lot of black flecks in the wood. I started sanding the wood with a rough sandpaper going on to a medium grade and then fine before waxing it twice with a clear wax and wire wool. Then I upholstered the chair.

I hope that answers a little more about waxing AONB ;-)

Love it,you are very talented,keep up the good work.

Wow!! Love it. Beautiful job. Well done.

from Admin
 

Fantastic work (as usual), Pacman.

Thanks for sharing and inspiring!

Regards
Chris P
Admin

Cheers
 

Thanks All.

I just love this website: love what it does, the inspiration it gives, and the encouragement of one user to the next. There's a whole world of waste that can be re-used, re-homed and re-designed.

I would encourage anyone to give things a try: if you fail, what odds? - it was for the bin anyway ;-)

Happy New Year and keep recylcling :-)
 

Not a bad time for clearing out, giving away or up-cycling that project you had in mind for a while...

Here's a little something I did a while ago and completely transformed a table and chairs I collected from someone who had had enough of them. I love the look of it now whereas I wouldn't have given them a thought before the paint job.

Help
 

I recently bought an antique chair and would dearly love to reupholster it but I don't want to destroy it. Do you have any tips?

Loving all the makeovers - lots of talent and good eye on this board. Great to see good things not ending up in landfill.

Yeah, me too. It's always painful for me when people just throwaway stuff without any attempt to fix it. Or maybe that's just me :D
By the way, does any of you know anything about vinyl furniture repair? I've heard a lot of positive things about this, well, let's call it a hobby, and planning to get a repair kit as mentioned here to test it. What do you think? I'll definitely post photos here or in a new thread later. Cheers!

I never would have thought that this could be done with old furniture. You have golden hands master.

Hi Garden Junkie,
You could put up a photo of the chair on this website and ask for help. Usually the chair would need to be cleaned and repaired before deciding on the finish. People on here would be glad to offer advice.

Sorry about the delayed response.