Antique Living Room Set (2 of 4) - Antique Wing Chair - Black/Charcoal Geometric

This is one of 3 pieces in the same antique sofa set. We estimate that the set is from around the 1920s or 30s. The client had already had them reupholstered a few times in the past, and the last time she got them done, she had skirts added, and decorative front appliqués removed. She held on to these, and she wanted us to remove the skirts and reattach the appliqués. Since the appliqués were much darker, and none of the wood tones on anything matched anymore (as well as this particular chair having a broken foot), we refinished everything in a very dark walnut colour (it may appear black in some photos, but it is in fact brown).

Wing chair before:



Note hat the front (portion just below the seat cushion) is incorrectly upholstered on all 3 pieces (this chair, the sofa, and the other chair). The fabric should be attached to the wire edge of the springs, forming a crease here (see finished photos). As is now, it's very baggy and not appropriate for the style/age of the piece(s).



Over the years, the arms have become quite deformed. This piece (and any very old piece stuffed with straw) needs to have the foundation work redone every once in a while (20-30 years I'd guesstimate) but a lot of upholsterers don't bother. We care, we do this work. We strip antiques to the bare frames and start fresh.



There haven't been that many advancements in upholstery techniques, when it comes to antiques/traditional pieces, but this could have been done with hand stitching instead of all the tacks. Tacks are faster, but they definitely don't look that good. We will be doing a piping, and using ply grip (a flexible metal track that is hidden and holds the fabric).





Lots of little tacks, and a double piping that just ends abruptly.



Partially stripped frame. Note how loose and baggy the side panels have become over time. Some (lazy) upholsterers would either tack a new burlap on top of this, or do nothing, and simply add more stuffing to build-up the arms.



This is the first layer (deepest layer) of straw on the arm(s). This should be very tightly compacted, giving the flat wooden arm top a curved surface. As you can see, it's extremely loose and baggy.



Busted spring twines.



Correct (but deteriorated and probably original) 4-way tie. We no longer use 4-way, preferring 8-way ties, which are stronger, last longer, and support the stuffing better.



This shows the first stuffing (straw) on the other arm, after the old burlap has been removed. The stuffing is just lifted off (in one big chunk) and set aside for now.



I've never seen someone screw-up webbing like this. It's not uncommon to have to alter one row, but to completely forget to "basket weave" the webbing makes it incredibly weak. ALL 3 pieces were like this.



So much better:



Before I forget, note the broken front foot.

Completely stripped chair (before refinishing though - note colour difference between the legs and back), and with the new webbing, new spring ties (8 way). Also note flat arm tops.





Seat stuffing before putting it back in place (and arm stuffing on the bottom).



Skipped the edge roll, but you can see it in other posts, and on the other chair. Here's the chair with the seat foundation done (with rough cover), and with the arms redone, firmly compacted (original straw), new burlap, and the straw hand stitched. At this point the legs and back have been refinished, and the broken foot is repaired.



Stitched springs, and stuffing/rough covers on the wings.



Arm stuffing put back in place (again, lots of straw, and cotton), covered with rough covers. Seat (deck) in place. Note the rib where the fabric is attached the front edge (spring wire).



Nearly there.



DONE. I actually really love this piece. Both the colour/pattern, and the shape/look of it. The dark wood plays nicely with the black/charcoal grey print.

The seat cushion(s) in the entire set were replaced.







This was the broken foot. The dark stain really helps hide the joint.



Beautiful crisp arms, with a nice tight side panel. Also note the wing, with no more unsightly tacks.



The double piping goes around the wood band all around.

Victorian Tufted Parlor Chair - Denim Blue (Project of the Month)

Here is a lovely antique chair that looked fine, but was in need of an overhaul. I liked the velvet, but the client wanted the chair to match the wing chairs we recovered for her earlier this year: Blue wing chairs.

Before:



As soon as I had seen this chair, I was excited (because I love antiques), but I also felt that something was wrong about it... The seat just didn't look right.





After removing the seat fabric, I could see why it looked wrong. A previous upholsterer had covered over the original rails, which were in a beautiful walnut.



He (or she) really butchered the chair. This is heartbreaking to see.







The holes could be fixed (at additional cost) but the client didn't want to invest the extra money into the repairs.

The chair frame was very loose, so it had to be dismantled, scraped, and reglued.



All solid again, touched-up, and ready for webbing.



New webbing and 8-way hand tie.





New burlap.



Original straw-stuffed edge roll reattached and re-stitched.



The original straw, and horsehair were reused, along with fresh cotton.

Here's the finished chair. We did minimal additional damage to the rails (only 2 or 3 staples), should the next upholsterer/owner choose to repair the rails.



We were also extremely lucky to find a gimp cording (the ribbon edge) that was nearly a PERFECT match to the blue fabric. It's nearly invisible.



Note that the wood side braces are now much more visible, and not buried under fabric (see before photos).

Project of the Month - Fantastic Carved Mahogany Chair

This chair has been done for over a week, and I've been itching to post photos about its restoration, but due to the sheer volume of photos taken during the process (close to 200), it's taken me a while to decide which ones to choose, edit, and include in this post. That said, there are still 57 photos. I hope you will all enjoy seeing the process involved in an extensive antique chair restoration like this one.

The chair arrived to us at the shop in fairly nice shape, but with dirty and worn fabric, and with both front arm scrolls badly broken (and poorly repaired). The chair had a decorative edging (piping or gimp) but it was missing from the chair, which made it look even more rough. We could tell it was going to be a lot of work, but we didn't quite expect to have this much work to do on this chair initially (as you'll see).

The chair "as received":









Right Arm:



Left Arm:



As I pointed out earlier, the chair didn't seem to be too bad, up until we started to strip it down. One of the first discoveries was on the bottom. As you can see from the following photo, the webbing (straps) have been doubled-up in an attempt to re-stiffen the chair bottom, and you can also see a LOT of straw dust, which tells you that the stuffing has started to fall apart.



We also found that on top of the awful screws, the right arm had been repaired with a yellow number 2 pencil. What an awful repair. How is glue supposed to stick to the yellow paint? Are wooden dowels that expensive? Repairs like this on such a beautiful chair are a sad sight to see.



Chair partially stripped.



The springs themselves were fine, but all the ties were completely finished (meaning that all of the springs need to be taken out and re-tied.



More and more structural issues were found in the frame. Here you can see that all the glue blocks are unglued, on top of all the burlap, which is torn and falling apart.

Left side:



The other side was equally bad (Right side). The moulding along the bottom of the chair was also unglued and missing a chunk. This was likely a "factory goof" where the moulding was cut too short, but it originally had a patch which has fallen out and been lost.



One of the major issues was that the curved arms at the top of the chair were severely damaged along the edges. There was literally no wood left to tack our stuffing and fabric to.







These problems were caused by two things: number one is the grain direction, which is weak along the curve (especially on mahogany, which is a bit soft), and secondly, the bulk of the damage is from multiple upholstery jobs over the years. The sheer number of tacks put in and removed over time has really turned the wood into Swiss cheese. The only way to repair this is to patch and repair the wood, which was a LOT of work.

During the stripping-down process, we uncovered traces of at least 3 previous fabrics (on top of the white patterned fabric above). A burgundy, yellow (patterned), and light blue:



We stopped at this point, and called our client to tell her the bad news, and find out if she wanted us to continue with all the additional repairs, which would necessitate the complete dis-assembly of the chair frame, and several (complicated) wood repairs.



After confirmation, work continued on the chair. The upper back stuffing was removed, and the frame was gently knocked apart. Here you can see the front legs with worn sections cut away. We only removed the really bad sections to preserve as much of the original material as we could.



New mahogany patches were carefully cut, sanded, shaped, and fitted for each patch.



For the front legs, we were able to use the band saw to cut away the bad sections, but for the curved arm rests, we couldn't do this because of the complicated curves and angles, so all the patches had to be carefully hand carved. These repairs took an entire 8 hour day to complete.



The two most complicated patches were the two inside corners, which were both kind-of a banana curved shape.



Front legs:



Underside of left arm:



Underside of right arm:



Chair pieces:



After many hours, the chair frame was reassembled.



All of the tack holes in the frame along all the edges were filled.



Repaired and patched right and left arms:





Frame repairs before staining:











Moulding repair:



Frame after all the repairs were done, stained, and touched-up.





Now was finally time to start putting the chair back together. Here we see the new webbing and springs.



8-way hand tie.



New burlap cover.



After the new burlap, we re-installed the original straw-stuffed edge roll, re-stitched that in place, then re-applied the original straw and horse hair stuffing, which was then topped with cotton and a muslin top cover.



New fabric. The owner wanted a more modern look for the chair, and she chose this zigzag fabric with a coordinating deep maroon for the exterior.





Back stuffing re-installed, along with the new muslin cover, and top fabric. We had to make new patterns for these pieces since the originals were not the correct shapes to properly fit the curve.



Exterior fabric.



And finally, the finished chair. This is a truly stunning piece of furniture.











I really love this red.





A detail showing the beautiful hand carved mahogany legs, and the piping.



The repaired arms. The deep cracks are still a bit visible, but the chair had been repaired at least twice before, which made it very difficult to get a perfect clean joint (despite lots of hand carving and glue removal).







The bottom was finished in a black fabric using old fashioned tacks to keep the chair looking historic.