So.  I caved.  I was supposed to wait until my wingback chair was done before I refinished my Louis XV chair.  But, it was just sitting there.  And my fabric came. Sooo…

It really wasn’t that hard.  (Though there’s a lot to be said for having the right staples.)

First I ripped off all the gimp (the trim that was glue-gunned on) to reveal the staples, and started removing them.  (I used a flat head screwdriver and a pair of pliers, which worked well.)

The previous fabric was not great quality, and whatever was used on the faux finish flaked off while I worked, so I was glad to be redoing it.  The foam, however, was in great shape.

The chair back consisted of fabric stapled to the inside of the frame, a piece of foam, and more fabric stapled on top.

Then, because I’m lazy, I didn’t remove the seat foam to redo the frame, but covered it in a garbage bag and duct tape (I tried painters tape, but it was exceptionally lame.)

I call this look “White Trash Chic” :)

I sanded and wiped down the whole frame and did a layer of primer (though I barely had any left, and wish I’d done a better primer layer).  After that I followed up with a few coats of Rustoleum’s Heirloom white - a creamy ivory colour that works well with my fabric.  (Which, by the way, is “Varenna” in the “stone” colourway from Tonic Living.)

Once the paint dried I used the fabric I’d removed from the chair as a template to cut new pieces of fabric (however, I made my fabric pieces about an inch bigger on all sides to give me a margin of error.)  I then stapled away, attaching the new fabric and cutting off the excess.  For the seat back I had shorter staples that went in perfectly, but when I ran out we bought longer staples, which gave me all sorts of grief.  And here’s what I have now!

The chair needs a few paint touch-ups, and I have to find or make some welting cord to cover up the staples.  However, I’m guessing I’ll have to sew double welting cord… which I don’t know if I’m up to this point.  So I might just buy some gimp as a temporary solution.

And I have officially decided to only recover small chairs from now on!