Scary! Scary how these were probably sitting amongst a flea market for years in the corner, and they were just waiting to be given a little TLC. I did just that, a lot of that. Let me share with you the process ...
First I pulled inspiration for the chairs. What drew me to these chairs in the first place? The frame. I loved the curved shape of these chairs like the ones above. I sourced inspiration from various spots and was drawn to mostly dark textiles against shiny metal. So all there was to do, was put it all together.
So I set out to strip these chairs down to their original metal, which I thought was brass but quickly found out was not. To be honest, I really wasn't sure what it was, but I knew that simply stripping the layer of cream paint wasn't doing the trick. For the next attempt, I thought to paint them in a nice metallic paint. It seemed like a great idea, so I primed them and painted them a shiny gold metallic - no bueno. They looked bad, real bad. I knew these chairs were special so I wasn't trying to get them done to simply, get them done.
So back I went to multiple hardware stores and scoured the web for helpful info and found the solution. I just needed a more aggressive way of stripping off the paint! There were multiple, and I mean multiple layers of paint on these chairs. The gold that was initially under the cream paint was actually paint as well - like a gold plated film. So I went to town, and scrubbed like no other - you might have seen the vine video here or here earlier.
And the outcome was gorgeous chrome!!
I remember thinking, whew! And wow, all at the same time.
Next, the cushions had to be reupholstered. I was going to use this vintage deep blue velvet that I had in stock, but after finding out the frames were chrome I thought the best way to go would be a dark textile to really showcase the metal sheen.
I set out to find a nice textured textile in black. I found this gold speckled fabric but there wasn't enough of it to cover all of the cushions. Good thing that didn't work out because after a little more scouting - I found the perfect ikat. Black - silver - gold - modern...the perfect fabric to compliment these vintage yet modern frames.
Aren't they stunning?! Wouldn't they be great around a dining room table mixed with other chairs. It was so exciting to be able to debut them at our pop-up shop last week at Mockingbird Domestics, and paired with Stone Textile pillows - it was a match made in heaven.
A huge thanks to my husband, Josh, who was a really big help with finishing these pieces to be able to have them at the pop-up!
I look forward to expanding Magpie Fields to showcase more furniture in the future. If you are interested in these chairs, check them out here! If you would like us to scout out that perfect piece for your space, give us a shout at hello@magpiefields.com - we would be happy to help you! Happy weekend everyone! xo, e
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