Finally!- Chair Slipcover

After almost 2 years of contemplating making a slipcover for this chair:

I finally did it!

I inherited the chair from my younger brother, he was just going to throw it out and I had a perfect place for it in my son's room. It was a little worn, especially on the arms, but it had great bones, as they say. It sat just as it was in my son's room for almost a year. When we put our previous house up for sale, I actually draped the fabric that I had leftover from a previous project and intended to use to make a slipcover, over the chair so that it looked nice for showings. We eventually sold the house and I moved the chair into my son's new room as it was. Recently I read a post from Beckie at Infarrantly Creative about reupholstering a very similiar chair and I was motivated to finally tackle my project. I did not have a stapler, so ended up using a different method and actually making a slipcover. Here is the tutorial:

Materials
3-4 yards of fabric (I used a denim that has a little bit of stretch to it)
Measuring tape
Scissors
Pins

First I measured the width of the tops of the arms. Since my fabric was wide enough, I cut this strip first off of one side. I then measured each side and the back of the chair on the outside of the chair and cut pieces of fabric an inch wider and an inch longer. I placed the strip of fabric for the arms, upside down on top of the arm. Then I placed the fabric for the outside side of the arm face down and started pinning the two pieces together. I had about 1/2 inch on each side as I had cut the fabric an inch longer than the actual measurements. I pinned one whole arm on the chair and then sewed it and removed the pins.


After turning it right side out and making sure that it fit, I turned it wrong side out again and pinned the inside middle and other arm in the same manner. After sewing the other arm, checking to be sure that it fit, and turning it inside out again, I pinned the back on. This is what the chair looked like with the slipcover pinned together on the chair. The brown fabric is some felt that I had leftover in my stash that I used to make sure that I would have enough fabric.


Finally, I sewed the back on and then turned it right side out and tried it on the chair. Besides some pleats on the curve on the arm, I was pretty pleased with how it turned out. Finally, I cut some fabric to fit the seat and back cushions. I cut the fabric so that I could fold the fabric in half inside out, then I sewed 2 of the sides with the sewing machine. I sewed about a 2 inch straight line from the corners on the open end so that I could get nice straigt corners. Finally, I turned the pillowcase right side out, stuffed in the pillow and closed the remaining opening by hand with needle and thread. It would have been nice to put in some zippers so that I could have removed and wash these, but I did not have any on hand and did not want to wait another 2 years for the inspiration to finish this project!

From start to finish, it took about 4 hours to complete the entire chair. Allot at least 6 hours if you must feed your children dinner, get them a bedtime snack, and then tuck them into bed. Poor Randy tried to help keep the kids out of my hair, but cartoons are no substitute for time with mommy!

So here is the finished product (well almost, if I don't get a stapler and staple the bottom to the chair, I will be removing it and sewing the bottom hem to give it a more finished look):


I am so proud of myself that I contemplated moving the chair to our living room temporarily so that I could show off my handiwork to anyone that happened to stop by!