Chairs and cushions

Thought I'd share how I recovered the director's chairs and made the cushions for the summerhouse.

The chairs...

I used the old covers to make a template for the new ones.

As you can see, the fabric was a little worn!

Very pleased with this fabric.  It needed to be quite robust and hard-wearing so don't choose anything too thin.  Remember the fabric will need to take your weight.

I sewed the back covers first.  The top and bottom edges were hemmed and the side edges were hemmed with a gap large enough to push the back upright struts of the chair into.

Finished back pieces.

The seat was similar - the back and front edges were hemmed but the side edges needed to be able to fit a small piece of dowling in.  This dowling then slots into two grooves on the chair and keeps the fabric seats firmly in place.  Of course other makes of director's chairs might be different.

I top stitched all the seams on the chairs for sturdiness.  It also looks  more attractive and professional.

The cushions...

I made two styles of cushion - this one which was rectangular, with a panel piece of the chair fabric and a Velcro fastening on the reverse.

The front - with the 3 sections of fabric.

Sewn together and top stitched.

The back was cut into 2 pieces straight down the middle. Then hemmed and Velcro attached for a nice neat and easy closure (below).

Both back and front were then sewn right sides together, and then turned right side out through the Velcro opening.

 The front of the finished cushion.

The second cushion was a 16" square with a pillowcase opening so I could add contrasting fabric and pretty ties.

The most complicated bit of this cushion is making sure your contrasting flap is sewn in the right way!

Cut a nice deep rectangle of fabric the same width as your main cushion piece.  Hem the one long end and then sew the other  end right sides together to the front of your cushion piece.  At this point you want to also slot it one lot of your ties.  These can be made from fabric, as I've done or you can use ribbon or anything you want really.

On the back piece of your cushion, hem the top edge and sew in the other two ties to the wrong side.  Make this a nice deep hem with some top stitching as it will form the opening of the cushion.

Put both right sides of your cushions together but make sure the contrasting flap is sewn the right way.  It has to encase both back and front pieces.  Sew along the each side and the bottom and turn the cushion back the right way.

A revamp

We've got a sweet little summerhouse in the garden and a few years ago I re-painted it inside and out and spruced it up a bit.  Unfortunately over the last winter, it became a bit of a dumping ground and became sadly neglected.  Which was a crying shame given the lovely summer we've had, so it was time to roll my sleeves up and restore it to it's former glory!

As you can see, not looking it's best, although the local spider population seemed very happy!  Getting rid of the ivy inside and out  took a whole morning.  I then gave the walls and ceiling a good brush and hoover and gave the floor a new coat of paint.  I didn't bother re-painting the walls as with the ivy out and a good brush they weren't too bad.  I had a rug in there that had got rather bedraggled over the winter but after washing it in the machine it came up a treat and looked great on the newly painted floor.  I cleaned all the windows too - what a difference that made! The next job was re-painting and re-covering the director's chairs.  I also made cushions for them and got some lovely fabric from our local store.  For instructions on how to make both click here.  I had a nice but uninspiring zinc lantern so I sprayed that white, along with a picture frame, tidied up the other decorations I already had in there and put it all back together.

Love the fabric on the chairs and cushions - it really matched the washed out green rug

Before spraying....

...and after, looking really clean and fresh.

Before spraying...

...and after, sprayed white with a small bit of distressing.  The picture was a print I did a some years ago of pebbles.  Looks much better in this white frame.

Looking forward to sitting out in it again (once the sun makes an appearance again!)

More sewing....

Having not done any sewing for a while, I think I've got the bug again.  The sewing machine was still set up from making the doorstop and I decided to tackle the rather old, in need of some TLC, bean bag cube in our living room.

We've had this cube for ever and it sits in the corner of our room.  I'm not sure we even notice it any more. It's funny how sometimes you just live with stuff and one day look at it and think'why?'  Why have I never got rid of this, why haven't I done something with it, why have I never tarted it up, does it even have a purpose?  Truth be told it's quite convenient if we suddenly need an extra 'seat' in the room and the nieces and nephew seem to love it!  They drape themselves over it whilst watching the TV inches away from their face!

Anyway, poor unloved cube.  I thought it was time I tried to make it look a bit more attractive.  I found this lovely red, cream and 'mushroomy' striped fabric in the sale and bought enough to re-cover the cube and make some new cushions too (I'll tackle those another day).

I unpicked the old faux leather cube and used the pieces to make a pattern template.  I decided to re-use the zip from the bottom as well, even though it's a bit darker than it should be and in hindsight, I wouldn't bother next time.  I would have created a Velcro flap on the underneath of something similar, but it's OK and overall it looks alright.

Putting the four sides together was a doddle and so was the top square. The main thing was getting the stripes matching.  I then sewed one half of the zip on and then I had to fit the bottom square onto the other half of the zip.  A little trickier this time and not amazing close up!

Then it was just a case of fitting the old sack inside containing all the little polystyrene beans.  I was fortunate to have some spare in the house and so I cut a hole and re-filled the bag with some extra, just to plump the whole thing up and sewed the hole back up after.

And here it is in it's new incarnation.......

Definitely an improvement, I think.  Cushions next......

How to make a fabric doorstop

It's been a while since I tackled any sewing projects, but  a few days ago I went into our local fabric store and saw some lovely heavy linen in a dark mushroom colour and thought it would be perfect for a doorstop for the bathroom.  The fabric had quite a French feel about it, a bit like an old sack, so I thought it would work really well with a French graphic transferred on.

I had in my stash some Lazertran transfer paper for fabric, so I used an old french perfume label from The Graphics Fairy, printed it on, made up the doorstop (not without a bit of unpicking and resewing along the way) and 'Hey Presto', a fabulous vintage looking doorstop.  I think the biggest compliment was when my husband came home and thought I'd bought it!

So this is how I made it...

I cut out 3 pieces.  The main body was 22cm x 52cm.  The top and bottom pieces were 15cm x 11cm and then I just cut out a strip for the handle.  This measured 32cm x 7cm but I cut it long as I wasn't sure how much I'd need, once sewn.

I then printed the image onto the fabric transfer paper (remember to reverse the image, otherwise it will come out back to front).  The image was then ironed on for about 2 minutes and allowed to cool before peeling off the backing paper.  I used Lazertran paper as I happened to have some lying around, but there are many products out there that would be suitable and The Graphics Fairy has some great tutorials on transferring images.

I then sewed together the ends of my long piece for the main body of the doorstop and ironed open the seam.

I then turned in the fabric edges of the handles and ironed them then sewed close to the edge on both sides, partly because it looked nice and also because it gave some body to the handle.  I then took the top piece of the doorstop and zig zagged around the edge to stop it fraying.  I sewed one end of the handle onto the top and then did another line of stitching about an inch in to strengthen it.  Allow enough room for you to pick the handle up and then sew the other side, once by the edge and then again an inch in.  Cut off the excess fabric, as in the photo.

This is the tricky bit, as you need to fit your main fabric body around the top rectangle.  It's worth pinning to fit into place before sewing as stretching can create a bad fit.  I have to confess that I had to unpick and sew this 3 times before I got it right!  I'm sure there's a better way out there......  Make sure you sew right sides together so that when you turn it out, everything is the right way round.

I then did eaxctly the same thing for the bottom rectangle but on this one, you need to leave a gap to turn the fabric right way out.

With the piece turned the right way, fill the gap with rice until you are about  two quarters full, maybe a little more.  I used a 2kg bag of rice plus a tiny bit more.  You can use sand instead.  Once full, stitch up the hole.  I hand stitched mine but you can do it on the machine.

And here's the finished doorstop!