Refinish it All: Re-upholstering a Bench

One thing on my DIY list is to re-upholster a chair and I’ve been watching Craig’s List for a piece I’d feel confident at giving it a shot. Check out how Eliana from Refinish it All did it. It’s her first time.

For $20 she found this upholstered bench. It took her a while to work up the courage but tackled it with an electric staple gun, staples, fabric, screwdrivers and needle nose pliers.

Before (flipped upside down with legs removed)

She removed all of the staples.

Advice from Eliana:

After taking the whole thing apart, dont wait 3 weeks to put it back together. You will forget the order things need to go back on.

Next, she painted the legs with Rust-oleum Lacquer paint in Black. Using the previous fabric as a pattern, she cut the new pieces a little bigger using a thicker fabric. Starting with the arms, she placed one of the old pieces on to better understand how the folds went.

The buttons for the arms presented a challenge. The fabric was too thick to fit inside the button, so she got creative and sewed and hot glued the fabric on.

Without a sewing machine, the piping on the front and back also created a challenge. She created the piping with some hot glue and a little love to the attach piece of fabric. She used hem tape and stapled the piece of fabric to the bottom.