Revamping an Old Chair for a New Purpose

This week I was asked to stage a vacant home in Malverne NY.  It's a lovely Dutch Colonial that has a great, homey feel to it.  When I looked at the home for the first time, I jotted down my ideas for which furnishings to bring to make this house feel even more like a home.  I usually know pretty quickly - but I knew that I might be missing one or two things that would make the staging complete.

The home featured an enclosed porch that's adjacent to the living room.  It's a narrow room, so I knew that I had to bring a loveseat.  But what should I place on the other side?   It needed a relaxed feel but the piece had to be a bit compact. A wing chair would be too formal and too large.  I had an idea what to use...but it needed a little work and an OK from my husband.

This is the piece I used...but it didn't start out that way.  It was dark and ugly but you didn't see much of it 'cause my husband's clothes covered most of it!  I convinced him I needed it for a job and that I had to lighten it up and make it prettier.  He said "Why?" and I just looked at him and then he said "OK!"

This picture would have looked funnier if I had taken it with all of his clothes racked on top of it - but at least I got a before (OK - with a few paint marks!).  I had to finish this in a hurry - like a half day - in order to get the staging job done. 

I used Annie Sloan's Chalk Paint in Cream.  I didn't have enough time to do the waxing but I add some nice stencilled French words, a motif or two and some distressing and the chair was ready to go. I used several word and graphic stencils from Maison de Stencils to make the job go quickly!

Here are some other shots of the home I staged...

It was a fun job - except for the fact that the air conditioning was not really working well (and it was about 100 degrees outside!).  But we managed to get all the furniture, lamps, rugs and accessories in - without dying of heatstroke. One of my great workers, Lyn, suggested to the realtors that perhaps they should take the winter cover off the air conditioning units.  That worked...alas too late!

Sharing this project with...

Under the Table and Dreaming; Funky Junk; At the Picket Fence; French Country Cottage; Sundae Scoop; Between Naps on the Porch; Be Colorful; Masterpiece Monday; Home Stories A to Z; My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia; Domestically Speaking; Savvy Southern Style; Knick of Time; The Southern Institute