Making a chaise lounge

Hi all. This is my new project. A chaise lounge from scratch.

I'm looking forward to this one. Its the sort of project I like because it incorporates a lot of skills including design, woodwork, metalwork and upholstery.

I've included a sketch of my design. I think it's robust enough to be usable but still (marginally) elegant. It probably isnt very nice to sit in, but who really sits in a chaise anyway.

I did do detailed plans but unfortunately lost them moving houses. The sketch is all I have left, but it should be enough to work from once I've reconstructed the dimensions. I find the dimensions the hardest part.

So currently I'm thinking:
1. make the body and arm rest using techniques more like building a wooden boat. Strong rigid and light.
2. use a subtractive approach to do the legs. Basically, just build up big blocks of cheap timber (laminated if necessary) and trim away using successively; arbotech, flap wheel, carving chisels, sandpaper.
3. make the back rest from steel - because I don't think I can make it rigid enough out of timber.
4. then upholster. z springs for the base. Quality webbing for the arm rest and back rest. Then the usual calico, hessian, foam and wadding. I've been using our industrial sewing machine a lot because I think its going to require a lot of sewing to get the upholstery neat and tight.

Colour scheme to be white fabric and very dark timber, stained to approximate Macassar ebony.

Naturally I'm going to do it as a WIP thread here. I hope some people find it interesting although I realise not many people here are interested in upholstery. Anyway there's still a lot I don't know about making upholstered furniture so I'm hoping for some guidance along the way.

cheers
Arron

Attachment 417947

I'm pulling up my want to be chaise lounge(chair)
To see how you go at this
One thing I would like to build one day my self one day lol

Cheers Matt


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Simplicity

I'm pulling up my want to be chaise lounge(chair)
To see how you go at this
One thing I would like to build one day my self one day lol

Cheers Matt

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Well I'm glad to know someone else is interested.

Anyway this project is doing my head in. I've spent the last two days trying to iron out all the problems involved in going from design to making - there are so many issues, especially when you are trying to make something which is not just strong enough for big people to relax on, but it has to be light too because my wife and I have noticed were not getting any younger and we have decided we don't want any more heavy things in the house. In fact we don't actually have a house, we're renting a unit while waiting to buy and build - so we've got no space for more furniture, so it will have to be at least partly modular so it can be disassembled and live in our storage unit which is also full to the gunwhales. Plus anything upholstered has the added complication of needing strong and convenient attachment points for the upholstery - plus I think the design requires a clean and tight look so no wrinkles in the upholstery are acceptable - especially hard to eliminate where one padded surface meets another.

I think I will spend the weekend making a scaled down prototype to help me think the issues through.

Beauty! A chaise lounge is on my list of pieces to make. Love their curves. Watching this one!

This is interesting. I own two antique cedar chaise lounges (1820's and 1840's) but most people do not appreciate/like them at all. They are difficult to sit on "proper-like" but easy to recline on decadently!

Your concept design is very European in appearance. English and Australian chaises almost always have turned legs, though often shaped/reeded/fluted after turning. Germanic furniture had legs as you show and French furniture similar but embellished with curlicues etc.

The concept design also brings to mind the Art Deco period.

I would be careful about incorporating steel. The flexibility and movement of timber and steel are so different that you could make it weaker by doing that (in the long-term anyway). Given that my two chaises are very old and all timber (and cedar is a soft, though stable timber) it is clearly possible to make them strong enough in timber.

i will watch with interest.

David

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Xanthorrhoeas

They are difficult to sit on "proper-like" but easy to recline on decadently!

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I agree - they aren't very comfortable to sit on at all. I should point out that we already own one chaise which I've only ever sat on once, and my wife has never sat on at all as far as I can recall. It does make me wonder about what was different about people in Victorian times that meant they found a chaise comfortable. Maybe it was all that wearing of corsets and other stiff clothing which meant they could never really 'flop down' into a couch or chair, but kept at least partially erect all the time. And then of course there was all that fainting going on.

So obviously its just for show, and just as an interesting project.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Xanthorrhoeas

Your concept design is very European in appearance. English and Australian chaises almost always have turned legs, though often shaped/reeded/fluted after turning. Germanic furniture had legs as you show and French furniture similar but embellished with curlicues etc.

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Being a big fan of French furniture that was not accidental.

I will probably carve a very restrained curlicue into the vertical facepiece.

I wanted to avoid turned legs, but the more I work on my design the more I realise how hard I'm making it for myself. Turned legs would be so much easier, but I dislike those little stumpy turned legs you mention.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Xanthorrhoeas

I would be careful about incorporating steel. The flexibility and movement of timber and steel are so different that you could make it weaker by doing that (in the long-term anyway).

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After prototyping it today, I realise there is no role for steel.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Xanthorrhoeas

Given that my two chaises are very old and all timber (and cedar is a soft, though stable timber) it is clearly possible to make them strong enough in timber.

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I'm an incorrigible overbuilder.



cheers, glad to have you on board.
Arron

Hey David,
Could you do me a favour. Could you measure the length and width of the bed on those two chaises of yours ? By 'bed' I mean just the flat bit you lie on, not including the side arm or the back rest.

And can you tell me please how you feel about them (ie too long, too wide, too narrow etc) from both a functional and aesthetic perspective.

It would be much appreciated.
The dimensions are the hardest part.
Nonetheless I expect to cut up most of the timber tomorrow.
Thanks
Arron

Much of this weekend was spent making a scale model of the chaise, as a prototype.

Just a rough thing made with superglue and offcuts.

My intention was not really to make it to 'scale', but the main thing is that every piece of timber that will be in the finished article will be in the model, and all in the correct place. This allows me to see how it fits together and to solve the problems that I am not a sufficiently capable 3D thinker to nut out in my head.

Its amazing the way unsolvable problems melt away when you can actually see all the bits coming together.

This is the model.
Attachment 418253


and here it is with a bit of foam on to give a better idea of shape.
Attachment 418254



Now I want the finished item to be modular so that I can take it apart and store it if necessary. It will break down into 4 parts, and the model is the same. Each of the 4 parts will have to be finish-upholstered, and the whole lot held together with concealed fittings.
Attachment 418255

The parts are the 'base', the 'bed', the 'armrest' and the 'backrest'.

There are still problems though.

One issue arises fixing the backrest to the armrest. I want to fix the two together in two or three spots along the length of the armrest - so that the two provide bracing for each other. I think I can access the lower fixings by poking my arm up inside the armrest but I dont think I'll be able to reach right up to the top. Bear in mind that both parts will be fully upholstered at this stage, and I wont want to be peeling upholstery back or anything like that to access the concealed fitting.

One idea I've had for this is to have a hook thing, so the top of the backrest is hooked into a fitting on the armrest rather then the two screwed together. Then the backrest is lowered into place and the lower concealed fittings done up. Sounds easy to do, but my concern is that it may start squeaking further down the track.

The other issues involve the legs. The legs will be basically just planted on. The grain on the legs will run vertical, so I worry about whether they will be vulnerable to splitting as indicated below.

Attachment 418256

Also, the grain of the legs is vertical, but the grain of the base rails will be horizontal - naturally. Because the legs need to be solidly fixed to the base, and because they are not particularly robust over much of their area, I would like to glue them on to the rails. The problem is expansion and contraction being different between vertical and horizontal aligned grain.

Im not sure what to do about this. Maybe I could glue a piece of plywood between - so that there are two glue lines each needing to deal with expansion/contraction in one direction only, rather then one glue line dealing with e/c in both directions simultaneously.

I might have to make a prototype leg full size and think this out.

tomorrow is cut all the timber up day.

cheers
Arron

Yesterday I went to the local Men's Shed to cut up the timber. I can't run a tablesaw or thicknesses where we live, though I can drill, glue and assemble in the garage. No workbench, just working on the floor. Today I assembled the base, bed and armrest. Pictures below.

The dimensions are the hardest part. I kept thinking it's too short and too wide, but stick with the plan and it will work out. But no it is almost definitely too wide, and maybe too short. I think I'll wait till I've done the backrest before deciding. Adding length is easy enough, but I think it's 50mm too wide and that will need breaking apart. It will be a bit brutal because I'm mostly relying on adhesives for the joints..

Making timber frames for upholstered furniture proceeds very quickly - always surprising for someone who has a background in solid timber furniture. There is no finessing needed - it's mostly just straight off the saw. I structure things to make sure there is no downtime waiting for glue to set by using Quickset PVA and screws to remove the need for clamps.

I'm sure anyone who has taken sofas or armchairs apart has been amazed at how rough and ricketty they are underneath the fabric. I can't get into that way of thinking, I still try to make everything bombproof. At the same time I know that I've never been sitting on a couch and had it collapse under me, so I guess it's just me overbuilding everything.

Really, it's technically simple and not much to say about the woodwork itself.

It's on little temporary legs, just to get it up off the floor a bit.

And there needs to be a cross-brace to stop the bed sides spreading under weight - I forgot to cut that.

Next is the backrest, though the next few days are busy for me doing other things.

Cheers
Arron

Attachment 418407Attachment 418406

Arron.
The lounge is looking excellent.
Sorry for not contributing more, but you are doing a great WIP.

Cheers Matt

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Arron

Could you measure the length and width of the bed on those two chaises of yours ? By 'bed' I mean just the flat bit you lie on, not including the side arm or the back rest.

And can you tell me please how you feel about them (ie too long, too wide, too narrow etc) from both a functional and aesthetic perspective.
Nonetheless I expect to cut up most of the timber tomorrow.
Thanks
Arron

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Apologies Arron, I have been sick for a couple of days, so I'm sure this is too late. The 1820's chaise 'bed' measures 600 wide by 1750 long, the later one 600 x 1700. Both are comfortable to lie on.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Xanthorrhoeas

Apologies Arron, I have been sick for a couple of days, so I'm sure this is too late. The 1820's chaise 'bed' measures 600 wide by 1750 long, the later one 600 x 1700. Both are comfortable to lie on.

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Thanks very much. I'm pretty sure mine is too short and too wide. I guess I'll have to modify it, but I'll wait till the backrest is on before deciding. Going forward I'm just screwing things rather then gluing and screwing so I can take apart.

Cheers
Arron

And sorry, I should have asked you before - can you also give me the height of the top surface of the bed above the floor.

Thanks
Arron

Height above floor, top of mattress:

1820's = 460 mm
1840's = 440 mm

The top of the bed under the mattress:

1820's = 400 mm
1840's =360 mm

BTW, my antique chaises have mattresses "squabs" of teased horsehair. It is a marvellous material - after 150 years you can take it out, wash it and re-stuff the mattress and it is good as new. Modern foams, synthetics and materials like coconut fibre cannot compete for longevity.

As you can see from the above, the mattresses are different thicknesses. The 1820's mattress is original, the 1840's chaise we had someone reproduce a mattress in teased horsehair. It used to be available in Australia but as far as I know, no one imports the teased horsehair now. It is still available in China I think, because they still have large horses there.

Thanks for that. I'm not really trying to reproduce Victorian dimensions but it's interesting to get a perspective.

The horsehair is interesting stuff, but I've studied some trad upholstery books and the consensus seems to be that horsehair wasn't really used for primary padding on quality pieces. It played a role more like wadding does today - filling and smoothing. The primary stuffing would have been fibre, coir or that stuff derived from seaweed whose name I've forgotten.

Colonial pieces would be different because the dominant ethos was 'you use what you can get'.

On the subject of trad upholstery books, I'm reading one now called 'the essential guide to upholstery' by Dorothy Gates, which just happens to have a step-by-step on doing a daybed (chaise without a backrest) nearly identical in proportion to mine. Hers is a very traditional approach, coil springs, built up on top with fibre, hair and hessian, all top and blind stitched together with the great rolled edges. I'm wondering if I should (or could) do that here. I had intended just z springs with foam and wadding on top. Maybe I should rethink that. Cost is an issue though, and it wasn't really my intention to make this an epic.

Back to the Men's Shed yesterday to cut and shape timber for the backrest.

I used plywood for the backrest. Upholsterers generally prefer to use webbing because it will part to let a stray knee or foot through, rather then break. Nonetheless, I've used 6mm marine ply - it won't break but it has added a lot of weight.

The top rail of the backrest will need to be shaped to a rounded profile. I can't have the noise and mess at home so it will have to wait for next visit to the Men's Shed.

So this is what I've done so far. Those legs (feet) are just cardboard mock ups. I have also extended the length by 110mm, not a job of great finesse.
Attachment 418867

I took some time to go over the whole thing and make it fabric-friendly. This means rounding off corners and sanding rough patches that might otherwise tear or wear away fabric or webbing. It's also a chance to make sure there is timber in all the right spots to attach to. I also needed to provide gaps in strategic places so fabric is not pinched when the modules are put together.

I've also found the perfect thing to fix the top of the backrest to the top of the armrest, where it's inaccessible. These things
Attachment 418868

Otherwise the armrest and backrest are held on simply by 5/16ths bolts into 'T' nuts.

Next is rounding over the backrest rail, and starting on the legs.
Cheers
Arron

It is looking interesting. I have realised from that photo that the proportions of your chaise and my antique ones are quite different in another way. The antique chaises and double-ended sofas have a base that is much thinner - only approx. 100 mm and then have a loose (though fitted) padded mattress squab on top. That is because they are not sprung seats, the base has webbing straps across it then is covered by plain cloth. But then, they are not renowned for their comfort either, though we find them to be so.

When you upholster the base you might like to consider adding a horizontal line, a bead or some gimp sewn on, about halfway down to give it a lighter, less boxy look?

David

The timber frame is nearly done.

I rounded over the top of the backrest. It's not perfect, but I decided I wanted a handmade profile (with all the imperfections that involves) rather then a machine made or router-driven look.

Then I did the legs - or should they be called feet. As I mentioned above, this was done subtractive. I just built up some massive blocks of laminated pine and glued them to the ends. Like this

Attachment 419222

And then once the glue was dry I used a chainsaw to shape them. Lovely delicate tool for fine woodworking. Finished off with a flap wheel and a ROS. There is still a little bit more fine shaping to go - though I have promised myself I'm not going to get all anal-retentive about making each of the 4 legs the identical.

Attachment 419223

Next is painting. Probably the most challenging bit of the project - getting the look I want.

Arron

Nope, sorry, one more bit to go. The 'faceplate' of the armrest.

I have rough cut it from mahogany. I used mahogany because I wanted a nice carving timber. I had ideas of carving some feature along its length - some scrollwork or acanthus leaf. Then I decided I wanted a more constrained look - Im still not really sure I like carved furniture. So probably just one scroll at the end.

The mahogany will just be painted in with the rest.

Attachment 419224

There is a problem here. Where the mahogany faceplate meets the pine leg - a visible join here will be eye catching and ugly. Ideally, it should be done as one piece, so no join from bottom of leg to top of faceplate. However I want the whole thing to be modular and disassembleable. So there has to be a join. How to minimise it ? Any ideas anyone ? Or should just accept that it has to be there and learn to ignore it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Arron

I rounded over the top of the backrest. It's not perfect, but I decided I wanted a handmade profile (with all the imperfections that involves) rather then a machine made or router-driven look.
Arron

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Traditionally the shaped, rounded timber at the top of the side rest is well padded with cotton wadding or similar, so it didn't need to be perfectly shaped - all the unevennesses are hidden by the wadding.

I love those legs - very elegant indeed. Looking good!

David

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Arron

Nope, sorry, one more bit to go. The 'faceplate' of the armrest.

There is a problem here. Where the mahogany faceplate meets the pine leg - a visible join here will be eye catching and ugly. Ideally, it should be done as one piece, so no join from bottom of leg to top of faceplate. However I want the whole thing to be modular and disassembleable. So there has to be a join. How to minimise it ? Any ideas anyone ? Or should just accept that it has to be there and learn to ignore it.

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It is IMHO, a shame to paint Mahogany - have you considered polishing only that piece as a show timber? Some antique furniture was fully upholstered except for some show panels on the arms. Those are more highly prized than the ones with no show timber.

Here are two historical examples of where the back joins the base for some ideas. One (1820's) covers the join with a moulding. The other (1840's) rounds over the boards at the join. Both make a feature of the join rather than try to hide it.
Attachment 419226 1840's
Attachment 419227 1820's

With the timberwork done, I've progressed the finish of the exposed timber.

I've decided not to add any carving. Its a shame really, I learnt to carve with the view of being able to embellish furniture that I make, but the same thing happens every time I get to this stage - I bail out of carving it at the last moment. The problem is that I dont want the look of traditional ornamental carving. I'm not trying to add antique elements to something made in the here and now. I'd like to be able to design carved elements which arise from a modern idiom but ultimately I'm just not a strong enough designer to do something we would be happy with.

So I'll just paint the exposed timber. I'm thinking green chalk paint with dark wax finish.

For now, I just need to prime the timber. I strongly advise not finishing the timber till the very last opportunity as the upholstery process requires fairly rough handling and its hard not to damage the finish. I'll do the final painting before the final upholstery fabric.

The exposed timber took a good deal of frigging because (using pine, because its free) I have had a bad case of the early wood/late wood thing.

So with grey primer on all the exposed timber, its time to do all the foundation layers of the upholstery.

I started with the bed.

I wrapped the timber in hessian. Basically this is just a tough and hard wearing material to stop the outer layers rubbing against the frame.

I used green hessian because it was cheap. No-one wants to buy lime green hessian so it was on special at $4 per metre at Spotlite. It wont be seen.

I ordered 9 guage zigzag springs from Home Upholstery ($60 approx for 20 metre roll), and 24 spring clips ($12). The spacing is 130mm. Cut the springs to length, bend the ends back towards the spring in a vice so they dont pop out of the clips, fit all 12 springs. Nail the clips home.

Attachment 419592

Ideally, the clips should be held on by narrow crowned staples. I dont have such things so I just use nails. I skew the nails in such that two resist outward force and one resists inward force.

Major takeaway - bend the cut ends of the springs in such a way that they dont point up when the spring is fitted, and round the cut ends over on a grinder before you fit them. I didnt think of that, so you can see the sharp little ends I ended up with. Very hard to fix in situ.

Attachment 419593

You want the springs to bow upwards, cresting about 30-50mm above the level of the clips is apparently ideal.

I would have preferred flatter, as boxy is the look I'm going for, but I could not have stretched them any flatter.

The tension on the springs is immense. It took 2 people to fit a spring. Takeaway - perhaps start by making a spring tensioner.

Once the springs were fitted I had to add two more braces as the bed was deforming.

Oddly, the sides of the bed were pulled inwards by the springs - not pushed outward as you might expect.

Then some very strong twine (250kg breaking strain) is fixed on and looped around the springs to force them to act as one unit, to a degree. Its better to use paper coated wire and special clips. I skipped those because I'm trying to do this for a reasonable cost but there seems to be so many things to buy that it gets out of hand.

The blue fabric wrapped around the springs at each end of the bed is simply to stop the first and last spring from moving too far away from the frame when one sits down. I dont see the need for it, but Google suggests it should be done.

Then some hessian over the whole lot. This is mainly to stop the foam being cut up on the springs. More green.

And the finished bed.

Attachment 419594

Got to be happy with that.

I think I will cut some wedges of foam on the bandsaw and use them to build up the ends a bit, I dont like the way the first and last spring is pulled down below the level of the others.

This is what it looks like underneath. Simple is good.

Attachment 419595

cheers
Arron

Sorry for the photos being upside down in the last post. Mystery.

I have shopped for some foam. The best solution was just to order a very large sheet of 50mm foam from Home Upholstery for about $100. Two layers will give me the 100mm covering for the springs on the bed. The balance of the sheet will be used for covering the armrest. It works out about 1/4 to 1/3 the price of buying cut-to-size foam at Clark Rubber.

The remainder of the surfaces get covered in 'peeled foam', which is just 12mm soft foam.

I did the armrest too.

Not much to show here. Webbing stretched straight across. This is premium seat webbing, which is probably overkill, but I had it already.

Attachment 419596

And more of the lime green hessian. This is mainly to stop the webbing cutting into the foam.

Attachment 419597

It looks like these photos will be upside down too. Not really much to see so I'll leave them that way (not that I have a choice anyway).

cheers
Arron

A little more progress.

Attachment 419773

The fabric edge alongside the feet will require concealed finishing so I used 'sharktrim'.

Attachment 419774

Now it's ready for the foam. I have on hand 50 mm soft-medium seat foam, 25mm medium back foam, 25mm soft foam and 10mm peeled foam. Some of the foam needs to be cut into tapered strips to build up the edges, so I'll need to make a bandsaw jig for that.

Another lesson learnt: Most of the webbing used on the armrest is premium seat webbing. However I ran out where it curves over the top and needed two more pieces so I used some soft back webbing. I was just trying to avoid the delay and cost of buying another roll. Dumb shortcut. Stretching the hessian over makes these distort under tension in an ugly way. I can build it up with foam I guess. It wouldn't of mattered if I had started at the top and ran out towards the bottom. Planning needed - work from most critical to least.

It's looking good - very elegant. I know they are under-layers and wont be seen but I actually like the green and grey! Very 'interior designer'.

David

Yep, I was starting to like the green too.

Anyway, the foam is on so it's all hidden now.

Attachment 420099

Lesson learnt: glueing foam using pva. Previously I've used those pathetic spray can glues, or contact glues in a can. Unless you're in a hurry, plain old pva is good - I always think of it as a wood glue but for foam to wood, foam to foam or foam to natural fibre fabric it's cheap, reliable and flexible enough for most things.

You might need to get a specialised foam glue if you want something really flexible and strong though, like the top surface of something you sit on.

You might also notice I have added a simple carving to the arm. I tried leaving it unembellished but it was too plain. Also we've decided to paint the exposed timber in Porters chalk emulsion and black wax, and the wax needs some nooks and crannies to settle into. Now I wish I'd added some tiny ornamental carving to the feet - mainly just to retain some wax.

Other then that, the design looks ok. I probably should have beefed the feet up a bit more, to better balance them with the body. Actually, I think what happened is I chopped away a bit much timber trying to get a smooth finish.

It does look boxy but remember people will be viewing it standing above, or nearly so.

On to the painting.

Cheers
Arron

Better and Better. Is that an applied carving to the arm or am I seeing the reverse of life? You could apply some carving to the legs, though I like the simplicity of them.

David

Carving is just stuck on.
Cheers
Arron

I painted the exposed timber yesterday, using Porters chalk emulsion. Then rubbed Porters Dark Wax in and buffed it up. Not really sure I like the effect - but I've decided to ignore that and hope it comes good at the end (somehow).

Then I started doing the fabric. I'm using this white stretchy stuff, largely because it's free and I don't have to drive anywhere to get it.

I started on the backrest. I figured a good shortcut was to do it auto-trimmer style i.e. cut out some plywood, bend the fabric over the plywood and glue down, then glue the whole thing into final resting place. I guess that's the same way most people apply lining to boxes, though what works for a box turns out to be much harder when scaled up to furniture size. This is the effect. A bit rough so I may have to redo it - I'll wait to see if there are any leftovers first.
Attachment 420187
Attachment 420188

Actually, this bit faces to the rear so it will be low priority in terms of replacing it.

I think the brown/grey and white go together well.

Tomorrow Im off to the Men's Shed to get all of the rest of the fabric cut out and basted up ready for sewing.

Cheers
Arron

I spent some time working on the upholstery today and yesterday.

I showed above that I was using a white upholstery fabric. Turned out to be a bad idea. I think upholstering something in white is Ok if you have a clean, dedicated studio but when the only place you have to work is a grubby garage then it's impossible to keep it clean.

So I changed to a red fabric. That will mean the woodwork will need to be repainted as well.

This is progress so far
Attachment 420586

I don't really like this fabric either. The colour is OK but the style is dated. Shame. Too late to change now.

Doing the base was pretty straightforward. Just 'cut and staple', pushing the edges under the sharktrim.

The backrest was done, again, by fixing 25mm foam and 200gsm wadding to thin plywood, and then folding the fabric over and gluing down. Just like lining a jewellery box.

The armrest was also just cut and staple, no sewing required. Getting the pleats right and all held in place by the sharktrim was amazingly frustrating. Or perhaps there is a better way to do it that I don't know about - maybe sewing the pleats first somehow before fitting the fabric. I just can't visualise in 3D strongly enough to know how that would work.

Ultimately the pleats rather loose their shape anyway being over soft foam and wadding.

The successful strategy was to put permanent staples in the concealed portion of the pleat, fold the fabric over and then hold in place with temporary staples. Try to get them all balanced and held down securely, then remove temp staples. On the bottom side of the scroll there is no timber to staple the sharktrim to, so it's held in place by hot-melt glue.

Anyway, the job is sound even if not as pretty as I had hoped.

Doing the bed part will take some time.

Cheers
Arron

Ps, this is how you fix sloppy woodworking in upholstery - just chop up some cardboard and staple it on. No sophistication needed.
Attachment 420587

Finished.

Well finished for now but because we don’t like the fabric much so I am aiming to recover it. This is normal for us. Because we are poor at choosing colours we almost always end up painting a room (or whatever it is we are doing) several times till we get the colour right.

I think it would take about 12 hours to recover - less if I can learn how to do the pleats properly. I think it’s worth that to get it right.

Anyway, here it is.

Attachment 420870



Finishing just required sewing up the fabric to cover the bed, with 4 box corners. I’m not a great sewer so I just prototype things first then take my time. Then stretching the cover over, with 200gsm wadding underneath to fill and smooth, and stapling down around the bottom. Then bolting the 4 components together.

Thank you for your kind comments and likes along the way.

On to the next project now. I’m thinking a shagreen-covered console table.

Cheers
Arron

Ps. Also, I was wrong about chaises being uncomfortable. It needs a bolster type pillow but is very comfortable.feels very luxurious.

Yes, those decorative bolsters are actually very useful. My antique bolsters are from 190 mm to 240 mm in diameter in case that helps.

I like the colour of your chaise, though would not have chosen those stripes. To each their own.

it looks like a great job.

David

Arron,
I haven't said much because you have done such a great job of describing your work along the way.
But I have been following it looks fantastic.
I one day hope to make one similar.
Well done [emoji106][emoji106]

Cheers Matt
Ps is it comfy

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Simplicity

Cheers Matt
Ps is it comfy

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Yes and no.
The base is really nice. 100mm of medium density foam over 9 guage springs is probably the perfect combination for comfort and support. Likewise the arm rest is pretty good too - at its max it’s about 75mm of foam over premium webbing. In neither case do you feel the structure underneath, in fact you are a long way from feeling it. This is all interesting stuff to know for future jobs.

Using the 200gsm wadding was pretty good too. I was full of questions like - the main one being whether you need to allow for it when sizing the covers for sewing. The answer is you don’t, just work off the size of the foam structure, but slip the wadding under and let it do it’s magic of filling and smoothing, and making ordinary things look luxurious.

However, I still don’t find the whole chaise lounge semi-reclining thing very comfortable. Maybe I have too many back problems, or maybe Victorians were just different. Not worried, I’ll stick to my recliner.

Arron

Excellent work. Thanks for sharing.