Thursday 6 February 2014

Fabulous Fabric: Upholstery

Since my small but wonderful art studio is finished end of last year I'm spending time in there regularly whether it's preparing for my workshops I organise every Monday and Tuesday, preparing for the life drawing class at Grays School of Art I attend myself or just working out concepts for new creative projects.

One of these projects was already getting shape the moment I finished the interior. The colour scheme of the office chair (black plastic and red furnishing) was really bothering me in the light interior and it made my wee studio even smaller!


Office chair before revamp

My collection of scraps and purchased fabric is gradually growing so it didn't take long to find the right combination. After I dismantled the furnishing from the plastic backing I measured the amount of fabric needed by covering it with a newspaper, traced around with a pen and cut it out. This was my pattern. Then I put the various pieces of fabric on to the newspaper pattern, moved them around to get the right design, cut some pieces to fit properly and sewed them all together.


Close-up of  sewed pieces of fabric

With a staple gun I fitted the fabric around the furnishing surfaces tightly (without taking off the old furnishing) and kept them apart. For the plastic parts of the chair I used Plastikote Antique White spraypaint. Several layers were needed to make a good covering. Et voilĂ , this is the result; a great revamp of an old office, if I may say so myself.



Revamped office chair


Top view revamped office chair

I used the app Instamag to create a professional look of my "new" chair, almost as if it was published in a real magazine!!

Magazine lay-out of revamped office chair with app Instamag

2 comments:

  1. What a great makeover Fen! I too have an old office chair, a very dull black. I have lots of fabric so now all I need is some time and imagination. I love your new chair and it looks very professional.

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  2. Thank you so much, Catherine! One thing I can advice to do is to sandpaper the plastic first before you spraypaint it. I was too eager to get started so I didn't bother. There are now a few spots where the paint has gone because of scratching against the table so I will have to fix this. I look forward seeing your finished product in due course!

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