Our First D.I.Y.

Remember those bentwood rockers that occupied everyone's living room in the 80's and 90's. If you didn't have one, there was one at your Granny's house. Many a cute sibling picture was taken in the bentwood but these rocking chairs eventually got relegated to the basement corner. Lots of trends clung on from the 90's and stayed around into the twenty-first century, but the monotone brown colour scheme-theme, thank god, did not. Every now and then, we are going to bring you one of our favourite DIY projects. To start it off, here is one of my proudest turn arounds.

When you look at the bones, the chair is pretty wicked. Beautiful design, unique and quirky. The problem is the hole-infested seating doesn't make it all that comfortable. I decided to paint the walnut brown wood a soft white, carrying on with the other decor in my living room. I covered the mesh with 2" foam and covered in a bold printed upholstery fabric. While its a pretty bold fabric, which I do like, there are also a ton of other neutrals that I can pull from as my apartment changes

To upholster, I took apart the chair, wrapped the foam around the seat and back and used my good ol' fashioned staple gun to make it all stick. I then wrapped the paisley canvas tightly on top, pleated it around the corners and stapled them all in place. A glue gun and some gorgeous navy blue grosgrain ribbon to cover all the seams, and the only step left was to screw it all back together.

I love how it all turned out. Its a great piece to stand out from the corner of my living room. A unique, comfortable chair that everyone retreats to. All of these steps are easy to use to transform any chair or antique furniture. As long as the piece has good bones, no cracks or rotten sections, go ahead. It's easy to replace screws and bolts. A little bit of wood glue, sandpaper, primer and paint go a long way. Furniture from the decades before Ikea and Jysk were made strong and solid. Not only is it an excellent form of recycling, its costs less money than buying something new and it will hold up much longer.

And I gotta say, it rocks!