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Young House Love » Furniture & Building » Painting And Reupholstering A Stool

| By Sherry Petersik | January 12, 2012 | 180 Comments

Painting And Reupholstering A Stool

This is another post that John wanted me to name Stool Boom (here’s why John likes that name). Anyway, a while back I redid a stool that wasn’t ours. It just showed up in the mail and I spruced it up. More on the mysterious mail thing in a minute. First here’s how I got ‘er done. This is a terrible before shot, but picture an old beat up periwinkle blue stool with nails and holes and a rotting wood top:

DIYStool Before With Nails

The first thing I did was get all the old nails out with the back of a hammer:

DIYStool Nails On Ground

Then I primed it and painted it a rich navy color (I just grabbed a $3 test pot of paint in Benjamin Moore’s Santa Monica Blue). Ignore the crazy-bright blue color going on in this picture – it’s a very strange camera trick. In real life = navy. Anyway, after my two coats of paint were dry, I dug up some extra loft batting (originally from JoAnn) that I already had and some fabric that I had around as well. Why? Because I’m cheap. And it’s not my stool. Haha. If you’re keeping track, so far, I had sunk $3 into someone else’s stool.

DIYStool Painted With Batti

Then I got fancy and picked up two $1.79 boxes of decorative nail heads (from JoAnn). I know, I splurged. What can I say, I’m a giver.

DIYStool Nailhead Box

I figured I could use these guys to secure my batting and my fabric along each side of the stool. So I just cut the batting and the fabric about two inches larger than the top of the stool on all sides, and pulled the excess down and folded it under for a nice clean line. Then I tapped each nail head into place to keep things secure. I spaced them about 2″ apart (and used a 2″ piece of cardboard as a spacer to keep the gaps consistent). About thirty taps later I had done one side…

DIYStool Nailheads SidebySi

I continued to tap my way around the other three sides and I was left with a sweet little stool to not call my own. Total cost: $6.58. Except I have no earthly idea why she looks royal blue again. See the pics above – that’s probably the most true that the blue looks. So it’s a nice rich color but not too bright in real life.

DIYStool After Nailheads

Here’s a full shot from the side (the same pic I should have taken as a before instead of a zoomed in crazy one):

DIYStool After Full

Then I hugged her, kissed her (more than once), and lovingly sent her off. Sniffle. Weird stool business going on, right?

Well, it was actually for the fine folks at Do It Yourself magazine…

DIYWinter Cover

… where we have a Q and A column called “He Said, She Said“…

DIYWinterColumn Small

… but in our column we don’t redo furniture, so the stool was for another article they were running in their winter issue about makeovers by a few bloggers who all received surprise items in the mail to redo. There were some pretty amazing fellow bloggers in the mix, like: Style Me Pretty, Centsational Girl, Jen Geigley, Renegade Handmade, and Lori Andrews. It was really fun see what they did, like this two-tiered-table turned cake stand from Style Me Pretty:

DIYWinter Stool Cover

And here’s my little stool makeover. I love how they styled it with yarn because of all the craft stuff that I have in our house, I have zero yarn. Haha.

DIYWinter Stool Feature

Oh and really savvy folks might even recognize the fabric as one of the ones we used for Clara’s weekly pictures. We love how it looks like water and the bean looks like she’s swimming in this pic.

Clara 46 Weeks

After making her quilt and birthday banner there was still more than enough for a surprise stool makeover. Gotta love it. What furniture have you guys been making over lately? Any painting or reupholstering going on? And kiddos swimming around on fabric? Hey, if it makes ’em happy…

Psst- We might be biased, but we think this video of Clara singing a medley of songs is the cutest thing ever. That girl loves to sing!

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Filed Under: Furniture & Building

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Comments

  1. Jesse says

    January 13, 2012 at 11:23 am

    WOW! The stool came out really great! And what an honor to be in the magazine… how fun! Did they contact you first or did it just show up randomly?!

    Reply
    • YoungHouseLove says

      January 13, 2012 at 12:22 pm

      They emailed first to see if I was game but it was very mysterious. I had no idea what would show up!

      xo,
      s

  2. brett says

    January 13, 2012 at 2:23 pm

    Working, building, never stopping, never sleeping.
    Working, making. Some for selling, some for keeping.

    Waiting for Guffman is one of my favorite movies – thanks guys, now I won’t be able to stop humming that song!

    Reply
  3. Kara says

    January 13, 2012 at 3:08 pm

    I’ve done quite a few furniture re-habs in the past, along with my mom (the other design half)

    http://thekerstenhaus.blogspot.com/p/furniture.html

    But i’m getting ready to re-upholster two matching chairs that my husband brought home from his work that they were getting ready to throw out! They’ve got simple, straight wood frames and brown tufted fabric seats and backs right now- I’m thinking of recovering them with an animal hyde pattern.

    Reply
    • YoungHouseLove says

      January 13, 2012 at 3:18 pm

      Ooh sounds fun.

      xo,
      s

  4. Kalin says

    January 17, 2012 at 3:19 pm

    This reminded me of the post where you reupholstered the old rocking chair you used individual nail heads rather than the nail head trim (cause it couldn’t be found at JoAnns) I just wanted to pass on where I found nail head trim at the best deal (even though it included the dreaded shipping!) it was through The Perfect Fit in Washington State (my home!) http://perfectfit.com/17416/154529/Decorative-Nails–Buttons/Nailhead-Trim-with-Nails.html

    It only comes in nickle and french natural but its 10 yards for close to half the price I was finding for 5 yards. I used it to do a double trim on an upholstered headboard (which turned out so fabulously elegant I still just sit and stare at it, my first true DIY project…so proud!)

    If shipping is too expensive through them to the East Coast I also contacted Massasoit/Tackband, Inc. in MA. I didn’t get any pricing from them but they have TONS more options in colors and sizes of the nail head trim.

    Just wanted to pass on the good DIY karma!

    Reply
    • YoungHouseLove says

      January 17, 2012 at 4:21 pm

      Love it! Thanks for the tip!

      xo,
      s

  5. Talia says

    February 8, 2012 at 10:29 pm

    My husband and I first met because of our mutual interest in Waiting For Guffman (yes, that’s weird, but no, we’re not all that strange). Anyway, I like you all so much more now (and I already loved this blog)!

    Hush, child, huuushh.

    Reply
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John and Sherry Sitting On Woven ChairHey, we’re John & Sherry. We’ve fixed up 7 homes, written books, designed products, started a podcast, and then downsized & moved to the beach! Here you’ll find over 3,000 DIY projects & home updates. More about us…
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