We love the fact that these guys do nothing but reupholster mid-century furniture. With the slogan "We can do anything to your mid-century chair," RetroRedo.com is an eBay or craigslist buyer's dream resource.
Here's how we'd work it: spot a great chair on eBay or craigslist. Buy it for a rock bottom price and ship it straight to RetroRedo.com for a makeover. Select a fabric from one of the terrific, contemporary and atomic-age upholstery lines they stock (these include Maharam and Angela Adams), and leave the rest to this Oklahoma-based specialty workshop.
In 7 days you get your newly-upholstered chair via mail.
That's not of course how RetroRedo.com expects it to go -- they expect you to send it yourself -- but we like the idea of never laying eyes on the chair in its ugly phase. It would feel like receiving a brand-new, custom-made chair instead of something musty and dusty out of a stranger's basement.
RetroRedo's website provides complete instructions on how to handle the shipping on the cheap: you disassemble your chair and send them only the seat for re-upholstering (in many mid-century styles the seat and base were designed to come apart). If you do it this way shipping usually costs about $20, and the re-upholstering starts at about $225 (for high-grade vinyl).
Please no purple vinyl Eames lounge chairs though. That's a sacrilege.
- Lisa
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Comments (21)
I used retro redo to redo two Eames shell chairs and they turned out wonderful . Lloyd the owner picked out the eames large grey dot fabric from Maharam and they turned out so cool.
I bought them at the fleemarket and had no idea
how to recover them . I saw the ad in Moderism
magazine and shipped them to Oklahoma for 25.00
and 1 week later they came back perfect i saw your story and it was accurate . They are a real find for mid-century furniture.
Ellen Silverman
retro redo finshed a Womb chair that i bought on ebay. I had it done in purple fabric and it looks nice . They are a nice company to do business with. I ended up talking to the owner several times on the phone and he was always more than helpful . I hope I can find some more great mid-century chairs that I can pick up cheap and recover cause this places prices beats every where. even if you have to box it up and ship it to them .
scott
i like the purple lounge chair I don't think it is sacrilege I wish i had it in my loft!!!!
You can have the purple lounge chair it is cool . I want that cowhide chair it is to die for .
i have the rug to match.
I am going to e-mail the company I think it is a knoll chair.? not sure
I looked at the retro redo website they have so many neat mid-century chairs. I don't know if they are for show or sale. I would love to have them in my place at P-Town
When i hit the retro redo web site i just got bounced with memories of the 60's and 70's my Dad was a
a partner with Skidmore Owings and Merrill,
Architecs , and He had those Eames chairs that are black and white check. He had 4 at conference table(
He loved them and told me the fabric was by Alexander Girard the guy who did the Braniff Planes and the LaFonda Del sol Resturant in NYC
Thanks for doing the story and finding the website. J
Last month I used Retro Redo to recover 2 Eames
LaFonda chairs that i found in SoHo. I kept them with the old worn out fabric for over a year cause no one around here in NYC wanted to recover them or did not know how to recover them . I boxed the chairs up and sent them to Tulsa Okla for 30.00
I got them back in 10 days with a Girard fabric that the owner said was the same as
the original ones . I love them they are in my apt . Every time i look at them they make me happy!!!!! Carol Ann Bassey
I want to thank the nice people that have written in saying nice things about my company I recognize 4 of the names and the chairs that I re did .
So many times I never hear from any one and for these folks to take the time to respond to this article I appreciate the kind words . I have shipped so many chairs to the Northeast i really had no idea that so many people read Apt Therapy . I love modern mid-century furniture and love to redo it. feel free to call or email me any time to ask questions. Lloyd Fadem
uh, btw, thats not an "eames" chair, but a rather poor copy.
bin ... if you went to the website you would see
that it was listed as a Selig lounge chair
There is only one Eames lounge chair and it is made by Herman Miller and has been since 1956, any other chairs were designed by Norman Cherner and others for various companies like Plycraft and Selig. For copys they were considered great in there day but never infringed on the Herman Miller "trade dress" copyright.
Those two companies lounge chairs were always cheaper than Herman Miller and 50 years later bring 10 percent of what a Miller chair brings.
Phillip NYC
Hi .... I am new to NYC can any readers tell us where to get cool mid-century furnitue, like Eames chairs , Herman Miller , Knoll,McCobb, Wakefield or any other cool stuff
for the Apt, any stores, that sell it for a good deal , or flee markets around the city or tri state area .
Claire and Christy
Post from Carol Ann Bassey said she sent chair to Tulsa for redo. To who in Tulsa? I live in Tulsa & need a womb chair recovered. Thanks much! Sue Newman 918 298 6396
I have 4 50's style dinette chairs that require reupholstering. I would like to match the original table (gracked ice gray). Can I send pictures of the chairs and get your feedback.
Phil
Sue, did you ever get ahold of Lloyd?
Go to Retroredo.com to get his contact info!
Lloyd Fadem at Retro Redo just finished redoing 4 bucket chairs in Eames small dot fabric they look so great!! I was very Happy with that company and the owner was so helpful finding me that fabric I love those chairs. .
Barb
from NYC the best place on earth!!!!!
I used retro redo after finding them on this site. I must say they did a great job on my shell chair.
I sent them 1 yard of Girard fabric that i found at a flea market several months ago that was so great. I think it was left over from the old Braniff airways days .Girard did all the Braniff stuff.
I know they do not make it any more as I have not seem it reproduced by Maharam .
Retro Redo put it on two old La Fonda shell chairs that I had and used vinyl on the sides. and the chair looks like a million bucks. I saw the chairs at the S.F.modern museum show on Girard and I was so impressed what a great job Retro Redo did and that I was able to salvage not only the junk pile chairs , but the fabric ,
I can not say enough good stuff about what a nice job they did.
i just reveived a set of selig chair pads for my Eames chair.
i sent the chair to retro redo in Oklahoma
and they came back done in a beautiful black vinyl.
I paid $450.00 for the complete set with new stuffing. I got the chair for 100.00 at a fleemarket in L.A. I can't believe how nice it looks . It looks every bit as Good as the Eames Herman Miller that I saw at DWR only
35 years older , and a little more time worn
I sent retro redo a Lafonda chair and asked them
to do it for me in Miller Stripe
Lloyd Fadem the owner said that none of his guys had ever done a LaFonda chair in Miller Stripe cause he was always afraid that the stripes would not match up and he always did them in vinyl.
After I told him i wanted the stripe fabric from Maharam.
he said he would give it a shot . Why i am commenting is the chair turned out fantastic the best i
have ever seen he matched up the stripes ( he said one of his guys who had 29 years experince did the chair. I can not believe how great it looks . I told him 10 times!!! and have two more chairs for him to redo, If the S.F. Museum wants another chair for the show i have it.
Jason Allen S.F. modern man .
I sent to Retro Redo a Eames side shell in sorry shape that I found in a dumpster.It said Herman Miller on the bottom so I knew it was worth something , I sent it to Okla
to Retro redo and they re did for me in a red vinyl for 225.00 and hooked me up with a fellow on ebay to get a effiel tower base that I paid 85.00 for.
Since I got the chair for free I now have 300.00 in the chair but it looks great in my Apt . I think it is funny that i found this old piece of Junk and turned it into something great , Evan at Retro Redo was a nice person to do business with.
Love this concept. Whenever, I have something done locally it takes forever and costs more than the worst case scenario I had in mind.
Hi I get lots of e mails from people all over the U.S.
asking me about the womb chair. I just finished one and shipped it out last week .
This chair is very difficult to recover as most of the womb chairs are from the 50's and the foam has become mush
We must replace that with new foam that we spray on with a glue then put the foam on and shape it to the chair .
The next step is picking a good fabric. We use maharam fabrics . We like medium , milestone, messenger They look great in red .. and they are very affordable .. but you can pick what ever fabric you like as long as it is a medium weight fabric that can be sewn . .
This chair must be hand sewn and it takes time and can be very time consumming .
We live in Tulsa Okla and it will cost around 200 in a large box to ship this chair . The cost of the chair is around $1400.00 just for labor as it take 3 days and that will inclued the maharam fabric . shipping is always up to the customer .
If you have any questions always feel free to email me at lfadem@cox.net
I appreciate the kind words that all of my cutomers have expressed on this website . We try to a good job at a fair price and judgeing from your comments I think that we are doing a good job
thanks
Lloyd