Month of Makeovers Day 19: Furniture FAIL redemption, maybe

These chairs for extra seating were left unfinished on Day 15 of our Month of Makeovers. Today was the day to get cracking and complete them.

I had already repainted the blue chair to match the green one.

That was the easy part. Deciding what to do with the seats was frustrating. They were frayed and splattered with stains I couldn’t get off. My plan was to recover them but I didn’t like any of the fabrics in my stash. I wasted a lot of time looking online for a vinyl or laminated fabric that would coordinate with the jadeite green. I found prints with olive green, lime green, emerald green, teal, avocado, broccoli, celery. Ugh. It was time to think outside of the box and IN a can.

Yes, dear reader, I painted them.

The Annie Sloan Chalk Paint used on the frames went on like a dream. After waxing it even had the soft sheen and texture of the original vinyl. Nice but boring. You wouldn’t even look twice.

How about a jolt of red stripes? I used the gridlines on my cutting board to easily position 3M painting tape for 1″ stripes. AS Emperor Red went on fast, too.

Unfortunately, the texture of the vinyl kept the tape from making a perfect seal. I wasn’t thrilled with the raggedy edges, but decided to ignore my perfectionism and go with it anyway.

Okay, okay! I couldn’t resist a little touch up painting.

This was followed by another coat of wax. As I was buffing I discovered the red paint doesn’t adhere to the underlying wax very well. Some of it rubbed off. Hmm. I’m not sure I really like this. I’ve never been a fan of the whole shabby chic faux distressing thing. I convince myself this looks kind of “authentic” vintage. Good enough for now.

I’m curious to find out how well the stripes will hold up to repeated contact with people’s bottoms. All I need now is twelve guests for dinner!

See the entire list of projects for our Month of Makeovers HERE.