The other day I purchased what I believe to be a Folke Ohlsson lounge chair for DUX. I purchased it from my girlfriends sister for $10. I knew it needed work and was hoping to be able to do it myself, however, I have several questions before I start.
1. What wood do you believe it is?
2. Will new stain damage the ink stamped "made in sweden" marks?
3. Should I custom order cushions online? anyone have experience replacing cushions?
4. Where would I find replacement seat straps for the bottom?
5. Should I tack them in with nails like the originals or would modern staples be a stronger fix? ( would staples damage some of the value of the chair? I know its not worth much )
Keep in mind I have refinished furniture in the past but nothing that involved cushions and re-straping.
finally I planed to stain the chair a dark espresso color what are your thoughts on my stain choice? What color might you pick for the cushion color if it were you? I thought about doing a gray tweed.
Thanks any help would be greatly appreciated.
OK.
Strip all the webbing from the chair.
Go over it with #0000 steel wool and a good teak oil. I wouldn't stain it. Learn to like it in its natural state! It'll look good when rubbed down and oiled.
You can buy Pirelli rubber webbing online or get the woven elastic webbing that is a little less expensive. A webbing stretcher tool will help to get it taut enough but you will need another person to staple or tack the webbing while you stretch it into place.
Figure out how taut you need the webbing and mark that point on it so that each strap has the same tension.
Any decent upholsterer can make box cushions. You don't need to go to a specialist! Just be sure to pick good upholstery fabric (54" wide--anything else is for garments or drapery). You can also have the upholsterer do the strapping if you want. Might be safer.
Gray tweed is fine, or wait until you have the wood refinished and then decide what looks best with it.
MAIN thing: Decide what thickness you want the cushions and make sure the upholsterer sticks to that! I've seen a lot of these chairs redone with too-thick cushions and it just looks...well, dumb.
Forgot...
Staples might work on the webbing if you can get your stapler to fire them all the way into the wood. A pneumatic stapler does a far better job of this than an electric or manual stapler.
Tacks are good. I've anchored elastic webbing with tacks and it is still holding up ok, though the chair in question doesn't get a lot of use...so I guess not a strong endorsement?
My dad
had a tack hammer with a magnetic head, so that tacks could be started with one hand (and without injury).
I agree with the advice to avoid stain. Why would one worry about the Sweden stamp, yet contemplate dark stain which would likely obliterate it ? Not sure I understand . . .
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