Upholstery Class: Week 1

Heya Nesters! Happy Monday morning to you all!  Most of you know that this past weekend, I started an upholstery class.  As soon as I signed up, I knew exactly what piece I would use.  Meet my rollback slipper chair.  I'm naming her Satine, as an homage to her Moulin Rouge-y vibe.  {And I also named my first chair, Buttercup, so why not keep the trend going?} Isn't she a beaut?

She's got good bones but man... she's been through the ringer and back. 

Yikes.  She's been used in my childhood bedroom, as "storage" in the basement, kitties have made this their bed.  I think its about time that Satine gets put to use again as a  beautiful accent chair. 

Class started off great.  I showed up about THIRTY minutes early.  {And that was after stopping for a cup of coffee! I am usually psychotically early about things like that.} I was greeted by my teacher, Kevin.  He was an incredibly kind gentleman who humored my chatter about this very blog and how thrilled I was to be in class and even helped me take the chair out of the car and into the classroom.   I also met the other teacher, Pamela, who was the saint that let me in the full class a mere 3 days before the session began.  Thank you Pamela! After our jawing, he said "So, want to get started?"  The remaining 7 students hadn't even shown up yet and he was turning me loose to the tigers! After a bit of inspection by Kevin and some comments like "Oh... that's interesting... You don't usually see that." I was instructed to remove the curvy L shaped panels that adorned the sides of the chair. 

So I grabbed my magnetic tack hammer and Flathead screwdriver and chipped away until it looked like this. And then I did the same to the front panel that only had batting inside, unlike the sides that had actual wood on either side.

Yummy! Can you say 60 year old dusty batting? And check out all those tacks! I had to remove every. single. one.

And then I flipped her over to see the bottom of the seat. Yikes. Pretty bad.  Someone has safety-pinned the loose fabric to the webbing.  That is the webbing that only went in one direction... If you don't know, it should look more like this:

via

I basically just peeled everything apart layer by layer, by layer. 

Who ever upholstered this chair used some interesting scraps to fill in some spots. {If I knew what these were supposed to do, I would tell you but I have no clue! Any ideas, Nesters?} 

So this is what 3 full hours of removing tacks has gotten me.  

Look at the color difference from the unexposed velvet to the worn, grungier velvet.  Amazing.  A gentleman in the class said it was magenta but not any magenta.  He said that it reminded him of the Crayola Crayon color Maganta that his sister used to solely use.  Dead accurate.  And I did that too.

It's amazing how quickly the morning passed and how I wanted to just continue on and not wait until next Saturday to do more!  This class is fabulous and I would highly recommend this school to anyone in the Greater Boston Area.  Take a peek at their website  Broadway Upholstery School  they are so great, I can't speak highly enough! {I have no been paid to say this, I am a paying customer of theirs, I am just totally and completely in love with taking this class.}

Kevin told me to be prepared with fabric next week! EEEEEEE!! Now I have to decide the style.  Velvet again?  Damask, perhaps? Nail-head trim?  Piping? Tufting? Buttons?  My spare time this week will be engulfed in sketching out ideas for her.  What are your thoughts, guys? What would you go for? 

I can't wait to show you next Monday and the next stage of progress!  Stay tuned for super fun goodies tomorrow!