When chair stain goes bad!

On Friday I promised you a look at the Danish chairs I picked up at a local thrift shop.  They have possibly the worst DIY stain job I have ever seen.  It looks like a lot of hate went into the staining and upholstering of these chairs. 

Here they are together.  I'll admit they don't look too bad from far away.  A little lumpy maybe, but not ready for the scrap heap yet.

But take a closer look and you can really see the shoddy job that someone did on these poor chairs.

I can't stress how terrible they look.  The stain is right over the brass sabots (yes, I totally had to Google to find out what the little brass feet on mid century furniture is called!).

I felt so sorry for them.  The upholstery job is almost as heinous as the stain.

And I don't even want to know what this is.  Bleugh!  Now do you see why they were only $12 each :-)

It was easy enough to separate the seat from the wooden frame.  I Googled around and decided to use Citristrip (from Home Depot) to try and bubble up the horrific stain job so I could scrape it off easily.  

I did a small text spot on the back of one of the chairs before layered it on the rest of the frame with an old paint brush.  I waited about 30 minutes and it seemed to work really well - cue lots and lots and lots of scraping.

And that's pretty much as far as I got this weekend.  Fingers crossed it's a case of getting a LOT worse before it gets better.

Kate

xxx

Flea Market Jackpot

This weekend I ventured out to Bama Flea mall (follow me on Instagram to keep up with all the thrifty goodness).  I couldn't remember the last time I was there, which is a definite sign a trip was long overdue. 

3 hours of rummaging, and these are all of my goodies in one neat shot. 

I couldn't resist the wooden shoe forms, they were only $8 for the pair.  No clue what I'm going to do with them, maybe I'll just pop them on a shelf.  I've seen a lot of vintage suitcases, but I thought finding one in white was unusual.  Great for extra storage and looks cute, in the cart it went.

The little mid century shelf was one of my favorite finds.  The glass needs a bit of a clean but everything else was in excellent condition.  The two orange and white pieces are retro salt and pepper shakers ($3).  The 4 milk glasses were $10 for the set.  I only noticed that one has a smaller base than the other 3 when I was setting them out to take this pic (clearly that one's the runt of the litter).

The white wavy light has to be my top flea market find.  Ever.  Yep, I said it.  EVER!  I couldn't believe it when I saw it.  There was no price on it, so I went straight to Google to see how much it would cost new (not going to lie, I totally checked Ikea just to be sure it wasn't one of theirs).  Turns out this was a Le Klint 172, a pretty iconic light designed by Poul Christiansen (thank you Wikipedia). 

They came back with a price of $69 and I managed to talk them down to $50.  I'm the worlds worst haggler, so was especially smug after getting the price down.  I'm keeping everything crossed that it works.

I couldn't resist a quick whiz round Pinterest to find some other rooms the Le Klint had been used in.  Standby for a Monday montage of pretty pictures.

Pinterest

Pinterest

Pinterest

Kelly Behun Studio

 

Did you pick up any bargains this weekend?

 

 Kate

xxx

Wonder Wall

On Monday we checked out how I turned a grubby grill into a fun note holder (more on that HERE).

On Wednesday it was the turn of a pair of thrifted wall sconces to be brightened up (more on that HERE).

And now, finally, its time to see what they all look like together.  "Good grief Kate, you really know how to drag a project out" I hear you cry.  Ha, I know - but I just love love love how it all turned out.

Our big blank bare grey wall has finally be transformed into a gallery-ish wall.

 

I tried to mix items that were personal to us, with colourful prints and things I'd made.  I knew I didn't want just a wall of frames, so mixed in the little shelf, the wall sconces and the upcycled note holder.

 

 

Emily Henderson of The Emily Henderson mentioned a little shelf exactly like this one in one of her Craigslist roundups, so I was especially smug to have picked mine up at a local flea mall for a crisp 1 dollar.

 

 

The little hexagonal mirrored tray was also a thrift store find.  It wont be long before there will be nothing new in our house, just a sea of thrift shop finds.  And I'm ok with that.

 

 

I'll give you one guess where the fan came from... altogether now... "a thrift shop".  But seriously, they are just the best places to find vintage bargains.  And no self respecting home blogger would be without their Design Sponge book. 

 

 

Going into the project, I knew the kind of overall shape I wanted to create and laid everything out on the bed to get a rough placement.  When it came to hammering the nails into the wall, I really just free styled it.  I wasn't concerned about having even spacing or anything hanging in line.  In fact, the more random the better.  Clearly if you want to hang pics in a grid, a level and tape measure and some serious calculations are required. 

 

 

Murph clearly wasn't too enamoured with my wall hanging technique.  You're looking the wrong way!!

 

 

This weekend I'm preparing to check off one of the major projects on the 2013 to do list.  Brace yourself Birmingham!!  Plus I have a sweet little Pottery Barn copy cat project in the works. 

 

Have a fantastic weekend whatever you have planned - hope to see you back here next week.

 

Kate

xxx

 

Wall Sconces with Love

I'm finally putting a dent in my spray painting hit list.  First was the metal grate (see more on that HERE) and next up were these 2 wall sconces.  They were a whopping $3 for the pair from Gardendale Flea Mall.  I love the shape, but wasn't in love with the colour.

I thought about painting them black.  Then I thought about painting them white.  Then the March issue of BHG Magazine arrived with all the bright spring colours, and so I decided on something completely different.  

I wouldn't describe myself as a lavender person, but I really like how they turned out.  I originally planned to hang them in the dining room, but shifted them to the master when my wonderwall began to take shape.

You can see my Dollar Store Ampersand art made it onto the wall too (see how it was made HERE).

In other cheapo art news:

Step 1 - buy cheap Big Lots sticker

Step 2 - stick to paper

Step 3 - put in frame

Hope to see you Friday for the big wonderwall reveal.  I couldn't be happier that our big grey wall has been transformed into a little pocket of loveliness.

 

Kate

xxx

Macklemore Challenge

This weekend I took a trip out to Pinson to visit Mission Possible thrift shop as part of Young House Love's Macklemore challenge (as if I ever needed an excuse to go to a Thrift shop).

The challenge was to see what goodies you could find with just $20.  You didn't have to spend the whole $20 but you shouldn't go over (Price is Right styleeee).  Then we'd have a good ole link party to share our spoils over on YHL today.

I immediately snapped up these two black candle holders.  They look like black glass but are only plastic (shhh, don't tell!).  That was a whopping $1.78 of the budget spent.  You've got to love Thrift Stores that just write the price on the item.

They had a couple of side tables that would have looked great refinished in a bright colour, but I couldn't resist these 2 lamps.  Ok, so the gold is terrible and they're not an exact pair, but I think when spray painted the same colour they will look great.  Now all I need is to decide what colour to paint them - any suggestions?

I only spent a total of just over $10 ($10.76 to be exact, the lamps were $3.99 and $4.99 each) and managed to pick up a pair of candle holders and a pair (ish) of lamps.  You can't beat that!

While I was in Pinson, I thought I may as well pop into Sonya's Stuff (think thrift store meets junk shop meets flea mall) .  I mean I was in the area so it'd be rude not too!  They had posted a pair of mid-century nightstands on Craigslist about a month ago.  I was sure they would have been snapped up, but thought I'd see what other goodies they had.

I couldn't believe it when I walked in and they were still available.  Clearly I grabbed them and ran. Here they are at home in the Master:

 

 

 

 

Lots more Master Bedroom updates to come next week.

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Kate

xxx

Old Stool

A few months ago I picked up this little stool for only $10 from Sonyas Stuff out in Pinson.  They do house clearances and have some amazing finds for cheaper than cheap. They never try and paint or fix up what they find so it's a great place to go if you're looking for a project. 

 

I wouldn't dream of painting the wood, but the beige top needed a bit of a makeover.  I hit up Joanns fabrics this weekend and picked out a striped fabric.  This was my first venture into upholstery and it went surprisingly well. It was as simple as measuring round the outside of the cushion, cutting the fabric about 2" wider around all sides, and stapling away.

 

 

 

A little Paul Smith-esque, perhaps??

 

 

Source

 

I love how it turned out.

 

 

 

 Kate

xxx

 

Smug thrifter alert!

I am feeling especially smug after my trip to J&J Junk at the weekend.  I managed to pick up some real mid-century treats. 

The Jacob Zook sign was a whopping $1 (admittedly, I had to Google it as I thought it was some magical board game I had never seen before!), the Royal Haeger vase another $1, and I splashed out on the mosaic trivet for a budget breaking $1.50.

 

Also making it into the basket this time around were a stack of orange melamine plate mates, a pair of lucite wine bottle holders (marked at $3 each - amazingly the nice cashier lady took exception to that lofty price tag and gave me the two for $3!) and a small wooden candle holder.

 

I was fully prepared this time with cash (they don't take cards) and wet wipes to wipe away the inevitable layer of grime that comes from rummaging through boxes of toot for 2 hours! 

 

A morning well spent. 

 

Kate

xxx

Master coming together

I couldn't resist a close up look at my favourite new dresser.

 

 

 With my favourite little yellow lamp, favourite knitted pouf, and favourite fuzzy felt containers.

 

 

These fuzzy little felt treats were from the dollar section in Target.

 

 

And this small ombre bowl was (surprise surprise) a thrift store find. 

 

 

One more time for those at the back.

 

 

Kate

xxx

Bumper year!

It wouldn't be a weekend without at least one trip to a thrift store or flea mall.  So I set the SatNav and hot footed it to Gardendale Flea Mall.  I hadn't been there in a few months, and they had some goooood stuff this time around.  I was specifically looking for furniture, and I wasn't disappointed.

The first thing I spied was this dresser.  I ripped the price tag off quicker than lightning so no one else could steal my the dresser.  It came with a mirror too, but I couldn't squeeze that in - a good excuse to pop back this weekend to pick it up.  And maybe have another quick look round :-)

Next up was this sweet shelving unit.  It was piled high with junk and fabric, but I know amazingness when I see it.

I also snapped up these 2 pictures

 

There was also a vintage orange chair that nearly made the cut.  I might buy it if it's still there this weekend.  Watch this space!