DIY upholstery tutorial

Obviously, if you're making a chair you want a comfortable seat on that thing.  Today's post is going to look at how you can do this yourself at home.  You'd use much the same method to re-upholster a chair you already have, and this is a great way to turn a knackered old piece of furniture into something useful that looks good in your home.  When you're done, you'll have a nice comfy upholstered seat like this one:

Upholstery is one of those things you don't want to pay someone else to do.  Upholsterers charge through the roof and it's not a difficult job.  I've started off with a piece of MDF cut to the shape of my chair seat, because I'm making my piece of furniture myself, but you can easily use this method to re-upholster a chair you already own.  If this is the case, the method becomes even easier because you will already have the shaped piece of MDF that held the original cushion - you'll just need to remove the old fabric.  The foam may be salvageable too.  I bought a piece of upholstery foam from Spotlight.  It's a good thick foam intended for making cushions, and I've made sure it's large enough to wrap around the edges of the MDF.

I also have a piece of upholstery fabric.

You'll need to place the foam and MDF board on top of the fabric (wrong side up, naturally), and cut a piece of the fabric large enough to wrap around over the MDF board. You then take your staple gun and staple the fabric to the MDF.  Don't worry if you don't have a staple gun, that just gives you an excuse to visit the hardware store.

Work your way around the cushion, pulling the fabric over the foam and MDF, and stapling it in place.

Cut away the excess fabric as you go.

This job takes about five minutes and it's not remotely difficult, so you'll be glad you decided to do your own upholstery.