Before & After: Leather Photo Stool

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This was the easiest thing I did all week. If you have a similar stool, you might find the same to be true.

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I bought this stool from a neighbor for $10. Chris has wanted a stool for playing the guitar, but we haven’t wanted to invest anything yet. When a neighbor posted that she was getting rid of it, I quickly snatched it up.

Chris was disgusted at the initial appearance of the stool. It had been well loved, the cushion was severely cracked and it had a layer of dust on top. All of the working parts moved smoothly, so it was just a matter of a simple face-lift. I’ve recovered a few stools in my day (1, 2), so I knew I could get it done in about 10 minutes. 15 minutes if you count stopping and taking pictures along the way.

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I already had the foam, leather and staples on-hand, so it was just a matter of finding 10 minutes to dedicate to finishing it off. I cut a rough circle of memory foam. I wasn’t perfect about it because I knew I was going to smash the heck out of it anyway.

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Leather has some stretchy properties, so I only measured an extra 3 inches around the sides for the leather and cut.

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Not doing anything to the existing padding, I piled on the new padding and leather and started to staple it down.

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It’s crucial to staple along opposite ends, first. Dividing the circle into quarters, then dividing again, and again, working all the way around switching off between stapling down horizontals and verticals.

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I ended up stapling all the way around using very little spacing between staples to keep the leather from pleating around the edges.

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Chris was impressed with the final piece, excited to practice his chords on it. But I’ve been using it in my studio for extra seating and animated gifs. It’s such a useful little piece in our home.

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Don’t you just love it when you find something with such great potential and it ends up being an easy fix?

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    1. juju says:

      you could count that as zero budget! I am all for the recycling of neighbor cast off, good job!

    2. phil says:

      very good work !!

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