The Chair That Redesigned a Room

Brace yourselves y'all.  I bought a new piece of furniture.  A brand new piece of furniture that requires no work beyond cutting the price tags off.  Meet my new desk chair:

Isn't she lovely?  I can justify this new furniture purchase because the piece is upholstered.  I don't do upholstery, and most used upholstered items look, well, used.  She's oh so comfortable and just what I need for all my late-night conference calls for work.  See that white dresser in the background?  That's my old desk chair, where I'd plop myself on the floor, spread out all my notes, and talk on the phone for an hour plus. 

Is it any wonder why I've had to visit a Chiropractor this past week?

I digress.  The only problem with my lovely new desk chair is that it doesn't fit my desk.  Most chairs don't fit my desk.  That's because my desk belonged to my mother, evidently when she was like seven.  It's a sweet little desk, complete with her name written on the desk top, but the problem is like her I've outgrown it.

My new old desk is in the basement - unlike the chair it needs work.  In an effort to prepare for the new old desk I've been purging and cleaning and reorganizing, in an attempt to make my office/closet a little more user-friendly.  All this because I had to go and buy a new desk chair.  It would have been easier to just keep sitting on the floor.

It's going to be a little bit before I can get to my new old desk because we've got some fun custom pieces we're working on.  Check out these guys:

They're stadium seats from Detroit's Tiger Stadium.  The customer wants to mount them to his deck which is SUCH a cool idea.  But in order to do that we've got to replace some of the rotted wooden slats, and give these guys a fresh coat of paint.  Sherwin Williams did a great color match for us in their oil-based exterior paint, which will help keep these guys protected from the elements while living outside.  I'm more of an Oriole's fan myself, but I can totally dig the sports history behind these two.  Somewhere, my grandfather's digging it too.  He's also sucking in his breath and telling me I'd better not touch them, I might break them and really they'd be much better off left alone.  If it can't be fixed with Scotch tape it shouldn't be messed with.  It's ok Pop, I got this.

We're also working on other seating of a completely different variety, check this handsome devil out:

This is for another client and OMG how much of a stud is that chair.  When the client and her husband purchased their first home this chair was left in the house.  So they adopted it and it's moved with them and while delivering a couple mirrors to client the chair was unearthed from the basement and passed off to us to work on.  We're going to strip him and re-stain him, and try to spruce up that leather seat.

Speaking of mirrors, these were the two custom mirrors we did for this client.

This mirror was propped up in a spare bedroom and had never been hung because it didn't really go with anything the couple owns.  But they loved the beveled glass and the frame, just not gold.  They wanted to go for a two-tone look - silver with a hint of gold.  I used a silver glaze which takes AGES to dry, but it turned out beautifully.  Take a look:

The inside of the frame has one more coat of silver finish than the outside of the frame, allowing the outside edges to show a little more of the gold yet still be toned down with the silver finish.  It's stunning and finally hanging on a wall as it should be!

The other mirror was a piece that I had.  The client loved the unique shape and we worked to come up with a color that would work in their den.  Below is the before and after:

This piece was interesting not only because of the subtle contrast between the wall color and the color of the mirror, but the arch of the mirror itself coordinates nicely with the arched windows that are on either side it.  

I was also able to wrap-up our own mirror for the bedroom.  This is the mirror that inspired our night-stand re-do.  Below is the before and after:

Frito's a little salty that he can no longer admire himself in it, but that's my grey-stained mirror. I love how it turned out!  It's such a beautiful complement to the bedroom.  The only thing I might have done differently is sand it lightly before sealing with poly to distress it ever-so-slightly.  But it's perfect as is, and fits in well with the bedroom

What doesn't fit in well with the bedroom is the chest you see beneath it.  That's our Lane cedar chest that came out of my grandparents house that is in desperate need of being refinished.  Someone chewed one of the corners, and the trim needs to be reattached along the bottom.  I'd like to make it darker and a little less red, but someone in my family has yet to come to terms with this so it's going to be a while before I'm able to get my hands on it.  Although this same someone who doesn't want me to refinish it is bringing her new dog over to stay with us at the end of this month, and this new dog's crate is going to have to go somewhere, so if I have to relocate that chest it's going into the basement and I'm stripping it.  Just sayin'.  

And this guy knows nothing about the chewed corners mentioned above.