My daughter wanted rid of a tub chair and asked if I would like it, not one to refuse a freebie, I gratefully accepted to take it off her hands…I had a plan!

 

I have always loved patchwork chairs but never upholstered before. Always up for a challenge I studied a few YouTubes and happened on a Debbie Shore video, worth a watch just to see Alfie her mahoosive dog wanting to settle in the chair she is working on. After a couple of views I thought I’d have a go.

Many moons ago a local lady curtain maker was needing to get rid of her fabric swatches and oddments of fabric. She heard that I did patchwork and asked me along to choose what I wanted.

Of course as soon as I got there I realised that they weren’t really suitable for patchwork…so not appearing to be rude, I accepted her offer.

I spent many hours removing the glued frames from the backs of each sample and sorted them into colours. I filed them away for a rainy day and there they stayed for many years.

Well the ‘rainy day’ is here, or rather a heatwave, let the battle begin….

First to remove all the staples…there are a lot…hubby got in on the act!

 

I then removed the whole cover and unpicked all the machine stitches to reveal the pattern templates.

I needed to audition for colours and approximate quantities, so laid all the pieces out, it’s quite surprising just how much fabric is needed.

I decided on sorting out some pinks and greens to go in my workroom…thought it a step too far for hubby, and me to be honest, to have a patchwork chair indoors….our little cottage is a patchwork overload already!

Now, as I mentioned before, we were in the middle of a heatwave, and my workroom in the garden is south facing and boy was it hot hot hot. But that wasn’t going to stop me, I ploughed on in the heat to see the finished result.

Three days later the last staple was stapled and newly painted legs screwed in.

Wiping the sweat from my brow I called hubby in to show him the result. He loved it and said……

“ That would look nice indoors” …men…don’t you just love ‘em!

I thoroughly enjoyed upcycling this chair so advertised locally for another one, it didn’t take too long for a few to appear…I chose this one for a tenner.

It was a different make to the previous one, but decided to risk it and use the previous templates.

With more delving in the swatch stash, I set to with another batch of colours. It’s quite surprising just how much fabric is needed to cover a chair and struggled to find enough swatches for the large outside pieces. But a quick rummage in my old curtain collection soon found the right colour to fit. It did look a bit curtainy but as this be on the back I wasn’t too worried.

These suited the colours in our little lounge, so with a little shifty around found a little home for it.

I was really pleased with this one and sent a photo to the local lady that sold me the chair…”wow…how lovely, I’ve got some curtain fabric swatches if you’d like them?”….would I!!! I feel another coming on!

The chairs were really popular on Facebook UKQU, and I was asked by some for the pattern, which you can find here….

https://ukqu.co.uk/shop/patterns-4/patched-tub-chair-pdf-pattern/?doing_wp_cron=1535565316.8541069030761718750000

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