Red Chairs

I found these lovely, lovely mid-century chairs on Craigslist a few weeks back. Between meetings on a Friday in the suburbs (I swear to goodness it just worked out that way), I swung by the seller's house, bought the two of them for $35, and then loaded up our big ol' Ford.  The previous owner bought them at a garage sale and tried to dye one red, as is evident from the picture above. The red looked great, actually, but the 1950s-ish fabric was too prickly and coarse to be saved. I found new red upholstery fabric online and ordered 12 yards to be used by my friendly neighborhood re-upholsterer. I wish I could say that I have the skills (or the time) to do it myself, but I don't. Thanks to a good Yelp recommendation, they are now in the queue for new dresses.

I did refinish the legs, though, with some dark Minwax stain. I used a new (to me) paint stripper product that was sprayable, so it was super easy to apply. Taking the old stain off with a wire brush was another matter, as I kept flicking splashes of stripper on my arms, legs, and face; it burned like Dante's seventh level. Thank God I decided to wear the safety goggles. The last step, i.e., applying the new stain, was a piece of cake after my dance with the caustic stripper rain. The legs aren't perfect, but I am pleased with them. Certainly the darker color is much nicer than the original scratched-up light brown.   

My idea is to put one chair in each of the two bedrooms for a pop of color. If I ever got a bee in my bonnet to put them together, that would work too in a matchy-matchy sort of way.