How to transform with Re-Upholstery

I love to re-invent a piece with new upholstery.
Especially if the piece is of sentimental value, an antique or just has great lines but needs to join the current decade.

See below for the sketch from from the amazing Dorita. My wonderful soft goods workroom and upholsterer worked with us to find the perfect mix of line, look and feel. Sketches, sample cushions, site visits to see the structures come together – we had a team overseeing all the details on this project.

Notice the simplified waterfall skirt, self welt, semi attached back and loose T-Cushion. We changed the cushion fill from all down/feather mix to an inner core with a down/feather wrap. Gives that amazing down feel, while still retaining some shape and structure. As much as I love the luxury of an all down/feather piece of upholstery, it is a total workout to “fluff” the cushions back to life after each sitting.

This is where we started:

The low skirt threw the proportions all off for me. And, the contrast welt distracted from the soon to be elegant lines of this vintage chair. We considered a welt detail at the skirt, but higher up, in line with the seat cushion (see below). But, in the end, this lower sitting chair needed less horizontal lines and more of a sleek vertical accent. When comparing the before and after, you will see that we also ended up raising the height of the back cushion, which makes the chair more in scale with the room.