I realized a couple of days ago that I could get the bedroom suite foyer finished pretty quickly since there are no really big projects for this area, so that’s what I’ve decided to focus on before I start sewing draperies for the bedroom. So yesterday, I pulled out the bench for the foyer corner and reupholstered it.
First, I had to decide if I wanted to make the bench narrower. Several people have said that they think the bench is too wide for the area, so after removing the original fabric, I placed the bench back into the corner to make the final decision on if I was going to cut it down to make it narrower or leave it as is.
Honestly, I like it just like it is. If I made it narrower so that there’s more room on the right, then I’d have to allow the same space on the left, and then I’d be left with a space between the bench and the wall. That seems annoying to me. And I actually really love the width as it is. I think it looks perfect.
So with that decision made, I was ready to get started on this makeover. I started by giving the base two coats of the same green paint that I used on the dresser. And you can see my view the whole time I was painting. 😀
But that’s okay. She’s pretty darn cute, and she keeps me company. Just as long as her tail stays out of the wet paint, we’re good.
After the paint had time to dry, I started on the upholstering. This was a quick and easy project. It’s pretty much a wrap-and-staple upholstering process except that the fabric doesn’t wrap underneath the padded top. Instead, I stapled it along the sides (because the plywood is glued to the base), and then I covered over the staples with green trim.
I started stapling in the middle of one of the long sides, right in the middle. I used about five staples to hold the fabric in place.
And then I pulled the fabric taut and stapled the opposite side in the middle.
And then I pulled the fabric taut on one end and put a few staples in the middle.
And then repeated that on the other end.
And then I went back and stapled the rest, working out from the center to the corners on each side of the bench. On the corners, I folded the extra fabric from the long sides over to the end, and then folded the fabric on the end on top of that and stapled it into place.
Once it was all stapled on, I used a razor blade (or several) to cut away the excess fabric.
And then I used my hot glue gun to glue green trim over the staples to finish it up.
And here’s the bench in place in the foyer, along with the watercolor chapel picture that I finally hung on the wall. I know I still need to get that cable relocated. It’s pretty distracting, and I’ll get to it soon enough. So you’ll have to look past it for now.
The new bench seems to be Cooper-approved. And I love how it turned out as well.
I wasn’t sure about the base being green, but in the end, I really like it. I think it adds just the right amount of color to this corner.
I also didn’t have time to sew my bird pillow yet, but here’s a glimpse of the bench with the pillows/pillow fabric.
I also added some other artwork to the foyer. I bought this Bible study book a long time ago, but I bought it specifically for the pictures.
I can’t remember the name of the artist, but there are 52 colorful pictures in the book that look similar to this…
I didn’t like all of them. A few of them had hands and people featured pretty prominently in the pictures, and I didn’t like any of those. For example, this is one that I didn’t like because of the hands.
And another one that I didn’t like because of the hand featured prominently. You get the idea. There were about five of these, I think. I didn’t want to use any of those.
And then there were a couple of them with a person featured prominently in the picture. I didn’t like these.
There were also a few that had people in them, but they weren’t huge and weren’t the main focus of the picture. I did like these.
So I cut out all of the ones I liked, and I ended up with sixteen.
And then I selected the four that had the most orange in them, and put them in the frames that I had previously used in this foyer. And then I hung these on the wall to the right of the closet doorway.
I love the color that this little grouping of pictures adds to that wall.
Here’s a wider view before I put the bench in place.
Addicted 2 Decorating is where I share my DIY and decorating journey as I remodel and decorate the 1948 fixer upper that my husband, Matt, and I bought in 2013. Matt has M.S. and is unable to do physical work, so I do the majority of the work on the house by myself. You can learn more about me here.
