Vintage Rocking Chair Re-Do

Ever consider reupholstering something, but intimidated by that process? Here’s a great way to get your feet wet… start on a small upholstery project, like this child’s vintage rocking chair re-do project I’m about to show you.

Our youngest grandson turned 1 this fall. His daddy loved his little rocking chair when he was a wee lad, so when I spotted this child’s vintage rocking chair at a yard sale this last spring, I immediately thought our grandson should have one too.

I had faith it could be re-done and look very cute.

I am not by any means a professional re-upholsterer, but this is a simple chair redo project. Though I’m sure a professional upholsterer would have a trick or two up their sleeve, I’m confident I can figure out how to redo it. This post, and this blog for that matter, is all about encouraging you non-professional upholsters and decorators with a desire to make your surroundings functional and beautiful and to show you that even with limited knowledge and tools I, and you can do it!

So, I started by ripping the old fabric and padding off the seat. Here’s a tip, when removing the old upholstery, study how it was applied. Even take pics if it’s complicated. That way you’ll have something to refer to when you get to putting the new back on. I’ve also used the old fabric for a pattern for new fabric on some projects.

After I cleaned the wooden frame, I primed and painted the chair white.

HERE is where I shop for decorative fabric and sewing supplies.

Next came the padding…

I basically cut the piece of padding as I was fitting it on the chair, cutting out the 4 corners. I made sure I left enough length all the way around for the batting to have enough to wrap around to the very bottom.

The padding is secured to the chair by using a hot-melt glue gun. The reason I glued the padding first, before the fabric goes on, was to help prevent the padding from moving around under the fabric and bunching up.

Then, moving on to the fabric. Unlike the padding where I cut out the square corner, which would have left raw edges to the fabric I cut a diagonal cut from the outside corner into just where the fabric of the seat hit the arm support.

I then folded back that fabric, creating a right angle with no raw edges.

I made sure to leave enough length of fabric around the bottom, to allow the extra needed to wrap around and attach on the bottom inside.

Here you can see what I mean… the fabric comes around and is glue-gunned all along the inside edge, securing it well. A staple gun would work great for this project too.

To finish off the bottom edge and add a little bit of pizzazz, I made some welting in a contrasting blue green polka dot fabric.

I didn’t have any normal welt cording, so I used some jute cording that worked great. Then with a zipper foot, and my sewing machine needle position all the way to the right, I could get a nice tight fit for it.

Here’s a close up of the welt. I folded and tucked the ends, so that when I placed and glued it on the bottom edges, it wouldn’t have any raw edges exposed.

Then one more little detail…

Along the side little edge of the fabric on the corners. I wanted to add a little handsome detail for our little fella that notices and will gently touch with the tiny tip of his finger all the minute details…

There, just 2 brads on the short sides to give it a finished detail. Those brads will also close off the front fold of fabric from gapping open at all.

You can also see the welting edge glued along the bottom.

Ta-da! All done. Isn’t it cute? The fabric I selected looked to me like a vintage fabric from the 1930’s, which is probably about when this child’s vintage rocking chair was made.

The rocking chair has since been given to our grandson and he’s learning how to crawl up and sit down in it. And talk about cute!… oh my word!

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Below are more sewing projects I’ve written about: