Surprise Surprise!

One of the joys of upholstering old furniture are the unexpected surprises which pop up. In the case of this old folding stool, with a home-made upholstery covering of someone's lovingly hand-stitched tapestry...

...it was finding this - a numbered piece of crisp(ish) cotton with beautiful stencil logo 'Australia - Sydney - Sheeting'. (Does anyone out there know what it would originally have been used for?)...

... and this - a little scrap of old newspaper (above) dated 1893 which fell out of the flocking,  and the two layers of old fabric underneath, this chintzy one (right), still as bright as the day it was used.








Here's some of the process me and my trusty assistant - my Mum, Viv (my first upholstery teacher!) - went through to bring the little stool back to its former glory... replacing the old planks under the seat with webbing, glueing the loose joints, restoring the timber, very, very carefully hand-washing and stretch-drying the tapestry, and then reupholstering the lot.

As good as new?

old rocker

here's one of this week's projects.... a well-loved but squeaky and slightly crooked old rocker


Before:

During:

 After:

No longer squeaky or crooked, new high-density foam, timber refinished, groovy new covers and the bonus: it's superbly comfortable.  Hope the client likes it!

70's style

Here's the latest makeover...

after

before

These cane chairs, circa 1970, were in great shape, but not the cushions. Even though the top pic was taken in a courtyard (overlooking Little Manly on Sydney Harbour, same client as the Oslo settee,) the fabric isn't actually an outdoor one.
Hopefully this new look is more appropriate to the chair style - using a fabric called Canopy from CLOTH fabrics latest range. This range pays strong tribute to 70's style, which I must admit isn't my favourite fashion era... however I do love what Julie Paterson of Cloth, has come up with here and think it really suits the chairs.

Now for the Not Upholstery News....

Even though this relates to my 'past life', and has nothing whatsoever to do with upholstery, I can't resist posting about this:
Last Friday night, at a 'galah' shindig on the Gold Coast, Jamberoo Native Nursery was awarded the Best Medium Production Nursery in AUSTRALIA award by the Nursery and Garden Industry of Australia.
This is a huge milestone in the nursery's history: we've won this category of the State awards for the past 6 years, always been eligible for the National title, but never quite made it till now. The competition from the other states is always of a very high standard and this year was no exception.
We're all simply frilled with the result. This pic shows me (in a 1960's borrowed lace dress), with my partner Geoff, our Production Manager Nathan Sparkes and Sales Manager Sarah Peacock, after receiving our award.
Woohoo!

Before & After

This recent job involved a major overhaul including:

• stripping of the old mahogany-coloured, scratched and dinged wood and complete re-finishing (done by my clever French Polishing accomplice) 
• complete reupholstery from the frame up (new webbing, foam,etc.)
• re-covering using French linen supplied by the chair's owner.

The turned wood on the legs is one of the interesting features of this chair... I've been trying to learn more about this furniture style. If any of you know anything, I'd love to hear from you.

Blood, sweat and moquette

No sewing project has ever caused me as much grief as this one. The project was to recover existing (old) foam to make 3 new cushions for this 1960's divan. The client is a collector and trader in mid-century furniture, and has a great eye for, and knowledge of, this era of furniture.
The grief came in dealing with the vintage fabric ("uncut moquette"). It looks and feels great, but under the sewing machine foot it just frayed and stretched and 'ran'. I spent hours unpicking and re-sewing, but seeing these pics of the finished result makes me feel better. (The client did up the divan himself, this is the 'Before')...

If you're in the market for this sort of furniture, drop me a line and I'll put you in touch with him. 


My partner Geoff has just bought this gorgeous Eames (group) office chair at a great price.

Digging Anthropology

I've been busy lately making a set of cushions and ottoman for a home in Leichhardt, Sydney.
The client picked up today and was stoked. The cushion range included scatter cushions in several styles and box-edge cushions for lounging on the floor, all (again) in Warwick's Anthropology range. This time the colour way is 'Antique' which is darker hued than what you've seen from me before in projects such as the Santa Fe chair.
My favourite was the little patchwork rectangular scatter,shown in foreground of above pic. I reckon this is absolutely the most comfy shape for lumbar support in a sofa, armchair or car seat.

cushys galore

the workshop has been busy in commissioned-cushion-making mode:

from lumbar cushions for the Oslo sofa now living at Little Manly,










to 4 big day-bed cushions each with 2 bolsters, destined for 2 beach-shacks down at Era (in the Royal National Park)



to outdoor cushions in light canvas for my wonderful mother-out-law Margaret (with a little handbag made out of the left-overs, just for fun).

Also these, made out of beautiful hand-prined pure linen. 

Fabric designer is Angie Lewin, whose work I love. If you like the design on this fabric, and don't yet know Angie's work, check out this little video, showing her explaining her design process in  her Norfolk (UK) studio:

There are lots of other commissions coming in - which is a great start for the business - but unfortunately all the orphans are feeling neglected and keep asking me "when's it our turn?"

Rapt! goes retail

 Well, sort of. The Santa Fe chair is now available for sale (on commission) at a just-opened shop in Berry, (about half an hour's drive south of Kiama, on the south coast of NSW).

MOSS NEST 'flora and flotsam for lovers of nature', is very different to all the other ubiquitous homeware boot-eeks with which Berry is well-supplied. It combines a classy little florist shop along with homewares (with a strong French bent), semi-industrial & upcycled furniture, original artwork and interesting womens' clothing (at surprisingly good prices). No website yet, but here's a link to the next best thing, a webpage with all the details:
Moss Nest @ Berry

The Santa Fe chair is very happy in its new surroundings but, hopefully, it won't be there long! 

(For more info on Santa Fe check back through previous posts, including this video of the entire construction process, or go to the SHOP page on this site if you're interested in purchasing direct from me).

Funky Spool Stool

Blogging has taken a back-seat lately, now that Bottoms' End is in full production mode.  A number of projects have been completed, including this commissioned Spool Stool.

For those of you who haven't seen Spool Stools before - the reason they're called this is because the frame of the stool is an upcycled electrical spool... like this...

At this stage Spool Stools are available only by order - cost approx. $350.00 (depending on fabric chosen). In future these will be stock items, available in a variety of fabrics and leg lengths & styles.
Please contact us via the Contact page if you'd like to discuss the infinite possibilities.












Here's one I prepared earlier: