Finally, finally, it’s time for the LAST post in my steps to reupholster a chair with two padded back panels. Today we’re handling how to recover a seat cushion.
If you’re new to this series, you can see Part 1 HERE and Part 2 HERE.
When we moved from the West Coast to the East Coast, we left our big furniture behind. After a year without a dining table, my hubby found this solid wood set and I said…hmm…I can do something with that!
Unfortunately, the internet failed me. I spent months scouring the web to figure out how to reattach an upholstered panel to a chair when there are panels on both sides, but hardly anything applicable showed up. In my last post I shared how I reattached those two padded back panels and today all that is left is to reupholster the dining chair seat cushion.
This will be nothing new for many of you, as there are a number of good tutorials on this, but just to show a complete picture of the work it took to redo these dining chairs, I am going to show you how I recovered the dining chair seat cushions.
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Materials Needed
- fabric of choice (see 1st post)
- fabric scissors
- seam ripper
- sewing machine
- pins
- staple gun and staples
Reupholstering Dining Room Chairs: Recover the Seat Cushion
This step was one of the more complicated steps. As noted in the first post, I took a picture of the seat cushions before I took them apart. I actually left one intact so I could reference it in this step since there is sewing involved. I will note that it is not necessary to sew, but it did make a more fitted outcome.
Sew together the seat cushion
After I had set one seat cushion aside as reference, I used a seam ripper to take apart the cushion cover so that it could be laid flat and used as a pattern. This was my guide and I traced the pattern on the back of the new fabric as described in the last post.
Using the intact cushion as a guide, I noted which edges would be sewn together.
Then I used some pins to pin those edges together. Remember to make sure the two outward-facing sides of the fabric are touching.
Get out your sewing machine (I actually went to my local library to sew the first few cushions! Can you believe that they have a sewing machine in our maker’s space?!) and sew the edges that you marked.
The more difficult piece was the rounded edge. I sewed carefully, pulled out the pins as I went and made sure that I was keeping the fabric from bunching too much.
Once all the corners are sewed, it’s time to staple it back onto the seat cushion.
Staple the fabric to the Seat Cushion
Fit the fabric over the cushion and staple the fabric to the back like you did for the padded back panels (here), only this time you don’t need to staple the tack strip beneath. These will be reattached with nails through the bottom of the chair.
When you recover the seat cushion, it’s important to make sure that it is a tight fit. To do this, there is an order/method to the stapling process.
Staple all the way around the outside. I started at the back of the cushion and stapled around the fitted edges first. To get the best fit, I pulled the fabric tight so that there were no wrinkles and put one staple on each of the straight edges. (When you let go it may wrinkle, like in the picture below. But it’s ok, that will be fixed when you add the rest of the staples.)
Then, I went back and stapled around those first two staples, pulling the fabric tight as I went.
After stapling around the fitted back edges of the seat cushion, I moved on to the front edge. This will be the most visible part of the seat cushion so I made sure that the entire edge was pulled tight with no wrinkles. I start in the center and work outward towards the edges.
Finally, staple along the left and right sides of the seat cushion.
TIP: If you get to a section where there is barely enough fabric to staple, even when you pull it tight, then use an additional pair of hands (or your own weight) to compress the cushion so that there is more fabric to pull over the edge. Once you release the weight on the cushion, it will just pull the fabric tight.
It’s important, if you do this, that you make sure that you don’t staple it with a wrinkle at the place where you had to add compression.
Once you’ve recovered the seat cushion, find the dust cover that you set aside and staple it back onto the chair.
Set the cushion back on the chair and use the screws you set aside earlier (see first post) to screw the seat back onto the chair!
TIP: Before you hammer or screw any of the pieces back onto the chair, spray them with Scotch Guard and let them dry! This will add an extra layer of protection to your fabric!
The Big Reveal!
Ok! It’s time for the big reveal!!
To remind you what the chairs looked like before….
Here they are now!
And, of course, we need to see the side-by-side!
This was a long project, but not a terribly expensive one. I hope it inspires you to give DIY reupholstery a try! (And if you’re not quite ready for a project the size of this one, check out my post on Easy Reusable DIY projets. There’s an easy project in there using old BBW candle jars. It’s the perfect way to keep all those BBW candles we burn through during the fall and winter from going to waste!)
Thank you so much for stopping by! If this post was helpful to you in any way, please consider pinning it to your DIY project board!
~Virginia
Linking up with: Inspiration Monday | Amaze Me Monday | Craftastic Monday | Inspiration Spotlight | Tips and Tutorials | Too Cute Tuesday | Sew It, Cook It, Craft It | Artsy-Fartsy Link Party | Pretty Pintastic Pinterest Party | Friday at the Fire Station
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WOW, the finished product looks amazing!! You did an unbelievable job, they look fantastic!
xx, Elise
http://www.sparkleandslippers.blogspot.com
Thank you Elise!! I am pretty pleased with them!
So I have this EXACT table. I just came across your post on Pinterest. I have been trying to figure this out for YEARS. I did it once but it is time to do it again and the tack strip is going to be a lifesaver! On a side note…. when you sit at this table, do you feel like either the chairs are too tall or the table is too short? Just curious. I always thought it was just a little off! You did a fantastic job and I am eager to attempt it myself! Thanks for the inspiration!
I agree with this. I no longer have this set myself, but it was like the tops of my legs were always scraping the bottom edge of the table top!
The chairs came out so well! Reupholstering still intimidates me, but I do love to admire other’s work.
Chic on the Cheap
Thank you! You know, reupholstering intimidated me too! I’m glad for how they turned out but I definitely can see why some people pay for it to be done! Ha!
What a gorgeous project! Great job dear, it’s like a whole new set of furniture!
Jessica | notjessfashion.com
Thank you! I wasn’t sure it would be worth all the work, but it definitely is!
Great job on this. Love taking on home decorating projects too!
Jessica | notjessfashion.com
Thank you! It’s always fun reinventing your space!
THANK YOU for this post! I have been about to lose my mind researching how to recover this very same set! The brad nails had me about crazy as I did not want to reattach the back that way. Your use of tack strips is genius. I appreciate your time in researching and generosity in sharing. Your set turned out gorgeous!!!!
Of course! I spent so much time trying to figure out what to do with these chairs myself! It makes me so happy to know that the post has helped other people in a similar situation! Thank you so much and good luck if you decide to recover the chairs!
How long did the whole project take? It looks amazing! My in-laws have the same set and I would love to do this for them!
You know, I did it over a period of a couple months just because I didn’t have a ton of free time to do it. I pretty much always worked on it Friday nights after work. It didn’t take too long to cut the fabric for the chairs, sew the fabric and staple it back onto the seat cushions. However, other parts of the process were harder. For example, part of why I spaced it out was because taking the chairs apart was somewhat arduous. It was easy to unscrew the seat cushions and use a screwdriver to pull the seat backs off of the chair (you can part one of the series for this) but it was a huge pain to try to pull the brad nails out of the chairs. Even worse was removing all the staples from the various layers of the cushions. That was the longest part. I would spend an evening/afternoon working on removing the staples and I would usually get one seat cushion and one chair back or two chair backs done in that time (like and hour, maybe hour and a half) and when I was done I was exhausted and my wrists hurt. So, I split it up.
If you did the whole process straight through, taking at least half a day at a time, I can see it taking a week! Hope that helps!
Wow! I was googling how to reupholster and I have this exact table and chairs so you’ve made all my instructions and measurements a breeze!
Glad it is useful to you! It’s shocking to me how many people have been looking to reupholster the exact same set! Crazy!
This is so amazing… I’m upholstering chairs for the first time and THESE are the chairs!! Thank you for this!
Perfect! So glad you found it just in time!
Thank you so much for this post! It looks great! I have the exact same set and have been trying to find a way to redo the chairs. I was wondering how you reattached the backs of the chairs without having nail holes?
I have this SAME exact set and couldn’t figure out how to reupholster the backs- now we know!! Thank you so much for this!!
Wow that’s incredible! I’ve just picked up some amazing mid century dining chairs in great condition that need reupholstering. So thank you for your tips! Great help! Looking forward to getting stuck into my project now 🙂
We recently purchased the same exact dining table and chairs! I am so thrilled to have found your blog on Pinterest.
We’re hosting Thanksgiving, so I have to get busy.
Thank you for documenting and sharing.
Beautiful job refinishing this set. I had this same set purchased 2006ish. I ended up rehoming it because my 3 young boys at the time were messy eaters and it’s amazing how mashed potatoes and peas ended up in the woodwork crevices. I can’t tell you how many hours I spent with furniture polish and a toothpick cleaning each one. Lol. I really like the light seats against the darker wood.
How do you put the seat backs back on?
These chairs are so cute! I love them so much. I have been looking for something like this to freshen up our kitchen! We are doing some kitchen cabinet refinishing next week and after that I would love to try and make these. Thanks for sharing!
Quedó maravilloso, felicitaciones.
WOW!! I just got this same table and chairs,,,,, I have a question,, is there a video of this??