Transformative

So there's this show called Flea Market Flip, where people go to flea markets and buy junky furniture for cheap, spruce up the items with fabric or paint or whatnot, then turn around sell the things for $300 a pop at another flea market. Brilliant!

Sometime last winter, between my 17th and 18th hour of binge-watching the show, I decided I, too, needed to reupholster something. Anything. Watch out, nearby ottoman, I'm coming for ya!

Alas, I couldn't exactly recreate the creative process of the show, since flea markets are far and few between around here, but we do have a lot of thrift stores. That's where I met this little bench. He cost $6.

Now, I know the cushion may look gray in that photo, but let me assure you, it was brown. Mud brown. Stale chocolate brown. Kindergarten Carpet Square brown. It had to go. And I could do it! Sure, I'd never reupholstered anything in my life, but how hard could it be? There were even instructions on the bottom of the stool!

So first step, unscrew cushion from legs.

So far, so good. Now, to remove the staples....

Staples... that really don't want to be removed....

Not from the first layer....

And not from the second layer of 80s grandma-y goodness....

I didn't even get a picture of the orange foam layer, below that! But you can kind of see it peeking through, there.

At last, after days of prying up staples and swearing, I reached the wooden base. There were still more staples to pry out. I lost count of how many I extracted altogether, but if I had to guess I'd say 902.

After taking a two day rest from the project, it was time to begin putting on the new batting & fabric. My mother offered to help me with this. Which meant she took over. In hindsight, I think she got the easy part of the project. Or at any rate, the fun part.

For the new cushion cover, I went with some fabric I'd bought several years ago, intending to make pillow cases. We began the process of stretching and stapling.

At last, the cushion was finished. It wasn't perfect, but by that point, I didn't care. 

It was on... sort of...

The original screws in the stool now wouldn't work because we'd put so much padding on this stool. They weren't long enough to keep the cushion pinned to the frame. I had to go find longer screws in our garage, and they ended up being mismatched, but IT'S OVER NOW AND NOBODY WILL KNOW.

Except you. You will know.

So that was that. And I even had enough material left over to make a pillow case!

But I'm done with furniture projects, now. Really. Over it.

Until the next Flea Market Flip marathon, anyway....