Furniture Up-do's / Home Decor / No-Sew / Paint

Ottoman Upholstery Up-do!

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I found this great ottoman at one of my thrift store haunts, it just had great bones and for a whopping $5 I couldn’t resist! ! With my new-found love of Burlap, I knew I had to make it awesome! I researched a lot of different ways to go about this and since I had never attempted an upholstery job before, I found out there are lots of difficult ways to go about this process. No wonder furniture is so expensive. So, I opted for my own easy version and it turned out great!

Materials needed: Footstool/ottoman, 1 yard of burlap, 5 packs of 25, Hillman Furniture Nails in Bronze (Lowes), Hot glue gun w/glue for fabric and wood (I use the long all purpose kind from Arrow at Lowes for everything, I hate not having the right glue),  hammer, flat head screwdriver, ruler, acrylic paint in brown, black and bronze, rotary cutter & mat or X-Acto knife/scissors, plain sheet of copy paper, spray adhesive, paint brush and sponges for stencils.

This particular ottoman did not have screws underneath to remove the cover and replace the fabric and just staple gun it down like some do, so I loosened the fabric all the way around with a hammer and flat head screw driver. The fabric cover was sewn to fit this ottoman and since lately I haven’t felt like breaking out the sewing machine, I decided on hot glue! Much faster less headache! I was going to just toss the cover, but underneath it was a cushion and a lot of loose batting. I was afraid without the cover the batting would bunch up under the Burlap. So, I just went with leaving it on to keep the cushion & batting in tack and just cover the old covering. When I pulled the edges of the cover up there were these sharp evil little nails on a cardboard strip rolled into the edges of the fabric, similar to carpet nails, holding it on. I removed them and the cardboard so I would not cause severe injury myself. Then place your fabric over the top and measure about 3-4 inches beyond the edge of wood you are going to glue to. Next I cut the fabric with my rotary, so easy! Love that thing!

Start at one end pull lightly and tuck in the fabric even with the edge of the cover and glue down tight. Work your way around. When you get to the ends fold and tuck them neatly and glue, glue, glue. I also glued inside the folds on the outside so they wouldn’t bulge out when finished. Next I took Bronze furniture nails and hammered them in all the way around. This takes a few tries to get them straight. Once you get used to it will get easier. I used a ruler in the beginning to get my spacing right. If you get them uneven just pull it out and try again. Buy extra nails you will need them! This helps to hold down the fabric and the glue. If you do not like this look you could leave them off, as long as you used enough glue it should be fine. That’s it for the covering! I can’t wait to do some thing else!!

It came out great~ I thought when I was finished it looked a little… well, plain. I didn’t have one of those cool french stencils on hand so I decided to make my own. I opted for  easy, using just a simple letter monogram. I pulled up a Word Document and manually changed the font size to 700. I then picked my font and printed it out. I took my rotary cutter and very slowly and carefully cut out the letter. I found if you cut the letter inside the black lines, it is easier to trim mistakes later with scissors. Spray the back of the paper with spray adhesive and center it on the fabric.

I mixed three colors of paint and tried them out to see which one I liked the best for the shade of Burlap I chose.  Then I took a paint brush and painted the thick letter areas and used a sponge to lightly dab the paint on the thin areas and edges. My paper was starting to soak up the paint and wrinkle so I removed it right away just in case it was going to bleed the paint outside the stencil. You can use freezer paper, I know some of you do, but regular paper worked just as well as long as you remove it right away. And that’s how it was done! Up-doing this ottoman was so easy and I can’t wait to do this on something else!!! I have declared this new year, the year I make over my house, so there is much more to come! Featured on:

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76 thoughts on “Ottoman Upholstery Up-do!”

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  16. Wow, this is BEAUTIFUL! Great work.

    I just started following (found you via pincushion creations)…would love if you’d check out my blog and consider following back!

    Also, could you tell me how you got that linky followers widget rather than the one with all the little pictures? I like it :)

    -Alisha @ SnugasaBugBaby.com

    Reply

  17. Love this…just bought some burlap and am eyeing my ottoman in my living room as I write this. It really doesn’t match… I like the whole – made i a day- and doing it the easy way – concept, that’s how I operate.

    Reply

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  45. This turned out beautiful! I wasn’t sure how you were going to fold the edges under, but your pictures make it look easy to do. The upholstery nails make it look so professional! I’m completely inspired. Your newest follower. I’d love for you to come check out sunnyvanilla.blogspot.com!

    Reply

  48. Love!! The burlap and monogram add such a charming and expensive touch!! Awesome job! I would love for you to come share tomorrow over at Passionatelyperfect.com!!

    Reply

  70. What a gorgeous project! I love something quick like that, makes me feel like I am super woman :-)

    Great blog, happy follower through pinterest now and google+

    Hope you find time to check-out my piece of blogland.

    Reply

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