We got an email from the talented owners of Barefoot Dwelling, a small vintage shop in Maryland. They found and gave a full head-to-toe makeover to this worn out Adrian Pearsall-designed chair. Take a peek at their magic…
Lisa and Mary wrote:
We're writing to share a really cool before and after on an amazing 1960's Slim Jim Chair by Craft Associates. We picked up this chair in DC at a very cool estate sale and restored it for a customer for her newly purchased Manhattan apartment. Obviously it required complete re-building and we just love the Studio Bon fabric Fuzz-Taffy with the walnut frame.
Thanks for sharing the project — it's always good to see what professionals can do to give a vintage piece a whole new life!
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wow, tall like giraffe..
love it!
Amazing!
I need to learn how to upholster.
so fun! great job.
The little pillow looks like a fanny pack to me. :) Love the fabric!
That is one crazy chair! Love it
That is probably the saddest before pic I have seen on apartment therapy. Great fix up though.
Gorgeous
That chair is kind of awesome.
Amazing shape.
Fantastic job, such a fun chair!!!
It looks wonderful! Love it!
That is FANTASTIC!
That "before" has to be one of the saddest chairs in the universe. I can't believe you were able to save it. Bravo. The new fabric is great.
Beautiful! So glad nobody said they preferred the before;)
Fabulous!
So glad you kept the wood intact, and the fabric seems true-to-the-era.
Love to see repurposing
this is awesome!
It's a giraffe chair! That is SO unique and awesome. Thanks for sharing it!
DAMN!
LOVE!
Perfect!!!! NEED
Maybe my favorite before/after yet. And they did it with no white paint at all! LOVE it.
LOL! "no white paint at all," "glad nobody said they liked the 'before' better." Thanks, folks, for the guffaws!
What get me is, I'm a child of the 60's and I don't remember ever in my LIFE seeing a chair like that. I'm dying to know what it went for at the estate sale. You'd think it was in the FREE box!
LOL! "and they did it with no white paint at all!" , "glad nobody said they liked the 'before' better." Thanks folks, for the guffaws!
What gets me is, I'm a child of the 60's and I don't remember ever in my LIFE seeing a chair like that. I'm dying to know what it went for at the estate sale. You'd think it was in the FREE box! Totally cool post.
Chair envy.
How much did the chair cost pre-make over?
How much did the re-building cost?
Whatever you paid was worth it. It looks fantastic.
Here's the thing, this is a great job refinished and reupholstering. I love the orangey color of the dots with the wood.
I think the large pattern chosen is too much. This chair makes a BIG statement on its own, I wouldn't throw a loud pattern on top of that. It feels unfocused to me. I definitely would've gone with a smaller/tigher pattern, but overall, great job!
Love this!
I think it's ugly both before and after!
I think the circles work well. Before, the chair had vertical stripes which made it seem even taller. With the circle pattern, the chair becomes more balanced and less awkward looking without taking away from the unique outline of the chair. A smaller pattern would look good too but the size of the circles used are fine. Notice how the size of the circle is perfect for the width of the cushion. Great job!
Wow. It took a good eye and knowledge about the chair's pedigree to see it's potential. Great job.
Such a bizarre chair -- ballsy restoration!
Drool!
This chair is 18 kinds of awesome.
!!!! This is exciting! I love!
Confession time: I find it a little hard to get excited about this. Yes, the makeover is flawless and the chair wonderful, but it seems to go against the spirit that has evolved in the Before & After segments.
We can't admire them for finding the inherent beauty in something that everyone else thought was ugly - this is a rare designer piece that will set you back 400-500 dollars even in scrappy condition. We can't admire them for doing it on a tight budget. We can't admire them for making something personal that they're going to cherish, since it's destined to go into some wealthy client's apartment. It's an expensive designer chair that's been rehabbed into an even more expensive designer chair. As such, hey, it's awesome, but it's completely predictable, even inevitable.
Hm, you actually make some interesting and valid points, blandwagon. I do agree with you on some level.
Still, the beauty in this is that they took a shabby chair that seems beyond repair and rehabbed it to like-new condition. That's pretty cool. And when else would we see a chair like that?
So cool. Very cool.
Love!
gorgeous!
Looks like a banana. I like the fabric that you picked to go on there.
The rehab is fantastic! But damn, the before looks so skanky I'd have a hard time forgetting...
Nice job ... you respected the integrity of the design.