Staining and Upholstering Chairs

When we started to look for dining room furniture for our home, I knew that I would want round back chairs. I have always loved the style, and the soft curves would be fitting for the look of our living room. We searched high and low for an affordable option that would match our color scheme, but finding the perfect ones seemed impossible. A couple of months ago, we found the correct style for sale, but when we received the chairs they were no where near the color of our table, so I decided to re-stain and re-upholster them myself.

The process was long and complicated, but this was the best way to guarantee that we would have the style of chair we envisioned. Here you can see the original chair, which was very gray covered in a rough gray fabric.

We took off the original gray fabric, and removed the old finish. After prepping the wood for staining (I read a lot on the nuances of how to properly remove old stain, sand, and condition wood), I applied a gel based stain that would closely match the color of our dinning room table.

Once the process of re-staining and finishing the wood on the chairs was complete, it was time to re-upholster. We looked at several fabric swatches, and decided on this light champagne color to create a soft, neutral space.

The last part of the process was to make piping for the bottom and back of each chair. Thankfully, I have plenty of experience with a sewing machine, so this was the easiest part of the project.

I made the piping on the bottom a bit thicker than the one on top as it seemed more fitting for the proportions. The piping not only hides the staples put in to hold the fabric, it also makes the chairs look complete and elegant.

This has been one of the most difficult projects I’ve taken on, but absolutely worth all of the effort. I love how the chairs look in our space, and can’t wait to finish the rest of the dinning room changes, which we will reveal here as soon as they are ready.