Great news!

You can now book online for the Tatton Park Upholstery Workshops - we have made it easier for you to register for the workshops held at the beautiful national trust property in Knutsford.

Take a look at the new booking page at www.plushreupholstery.com. 

Hope to see you there …..

These last few weeks have seen …

Vic take a broken footstool with a tapestry cover and up-cycle it with 'annie sloan' paints to the legs -in red, orange (her favourite colour!) and blue. She rebuilt the stool with a webbing, hessian and coir stuffing, before cover the stool in calico and then hessian ready for a coffee sack top covering - picture of the final piece to follow!

New student Denise, has recovered 2 bedroom chairs in her first term! A new record for speed upholstering, although I like to stress that upholstery should equally be about 'the journey' as 'the destination'! That aside, Denise has almost recovered both the chairs in matching chenille with piping edge. 

Sara's last project is another favour for a friend - she has kindly recovered a deep buttoned footstool in new and beautifully clean (for now) cream cotton. She has transformed the shabby valour footstool into a thing of beauty :)

Jayne powers on with her restoration of a traditional Edwardian armchair - she has rebuilt the arms, seat back and seat base. A quick layer of polyester wadding before the top fabric goes in - Jayne is putting a patch-work effect on and I will post pictures of the finished chair - nice choice of tweeds so it will look quite amazing.

Kate is battling with the buttoning on her majestically 'alpha' chair, in black velvet snake-skin effect fabric with red velvet buttoning - don't mess with this chair!  The back stapled in place, Kate is fitting the seat top fabric.  Thinking about trims - vinyl with black upholstery nails, or red velvet trim?

Pat, new student, brought a soft furnished bedroom chair as her first project. It required a lot of sewing and planning and buttoning but the end result is a far more pleasing chair than the original chair. Pat could not be persuaded to try different coloured buttons  .. this time!

Janice is recovering a Parker Knoll wingback armchair for her daughter in a fabulous pale grey wool herringbone. Recovering the arms was similar to solving the rubic's cube - lots of thinking, planning and working through and then to the execution. Looks simplier than it is.

Lisa is at the stitched edge stage of her chaise. Lots of regulating and checking of the roll size and height throughout, with the odd retry when needed. Second stuffing next and the seat will almost be finished. Traditional upholstery is so satisfying. 

Finally Hilary has almost completed her child's bedroom chair. With care and a few bloodied fingers, she is near to finishing the stitching of the chair edging and back. Hilary's methodical approach and care has proved worth the time and effort. Well, I think so.

More next month ...

This week, things have moved along quite a bit with the student's projects:

Lisa has secured the hessian over the first stuffing of coir - time was then spent regulating the stuffing to bring the hair forward in readiness for the stitched edge, and to work away any unevenness in the stuffing - ready for the stuffing ties to be sewn in place and the stitched edge to be created. Here we decided staple the hessian in place - needs lots of staples to ensure it is securely fixing - if not the hessian will pull away when stitching. 

New student Denise brought a modern bedroom chair as her first upholstery piece.  Having stripped the piece back to the foam, we started on the recovering of the seat back - refreshing the foam (which was in good condition) with a layer of polyester wadding and then fixing the top fabric in place with a staple gun.

Jayne is working on the seat of her Edwardian armchair.  She has completed the stitched edge. Here she is sewing in the bridle ties ready for the second stuffing - the picture on the right shows the second stuffing in place - just needs to be teased and tussled a little before the calico is applied. 

Kate is delight to be at the buttoning stage.  As Kate had not buttoned before we started by buttoning in calico - to get the feel of the buttoning process before working with the top fabric, and to better establish the buttoning pattern. Here, the buttoning pattern has been transferred onto the top fabric with a tacking stitch, and Kate works each button in place with the help of a regulator, carefully helping the folds along as she goes, starting in the centre and working outwards. The red buttons in the slate grey velvet is quite striking, and compliments the red painted woodwork. Very good first buttoning.

Hilary is taking great care in the restoration of her child's nursing chair. Having completed the fluted top, and piped edge, she is hand stitching the seat edge on place, befoe stap

I have started a wordpress blog which I shall aim to link to this site - so please take a look at http://plushupholstery.wordpress.com too. And enjoy!

Starting March 2014:

We are delighted to be offering a selection of upholstery taster workshops at Tatton Park starting early next year. The workshops hope to offer a relaxed and informal environment to introduce you to the heritage craft of upholstery. 

Set in the court yard workshops, with easy access to drop off and collect your piece, the setting is perfect for a day of upholstering.

There is a choice of weekday and weekend workshops, of between one and two days.

The workshops are designed for beginners, introducing students to the traditional skills and tools used in upholstery. Each student is provided with a tool pack to use on the day, and with limited numbers and two tutors you will receive plenty of individual tuition time.

The one day workshop are designed around the upholstery of a set choice of projects, for example drop-in dining room chairs, piano stools and ottoman lids.  There will be a selection of projects, stripped down ready to upholster, to buy, if you do not have your own project - or why not bring your own piece, stripped down and ready to go. These projects offer a good introduction to upholstery and offer the best chance of completing your piece that day.  All materials needed for the set projects is included in the price.  You will need to bring your top fabric if you have a fabric you would especially like to use - or a selection of fabrics will be available to purchase on the day too.  By way of refreshments lunch will provided at the Gardener's Cottage, Tatton's newest dining experience.

The two day workshop offers you a little more time to work on a slightly larger piece, and would suit those who have a project at home they would like to start.  Maybe you have a small bedroom chair, or a nursing chair you would like to upholster? As with the day course, all tools and equipment is provided for use on the workshop. Materials and top fabric are not included on this workshop as your individual project will dictate what materials are needed. But all materials are available to purchase on the day, and a price list will be made available to all students.  As with the day workshops, lunch is provided each day at the Gardner's Cottage.

If you would like more information then please email me at andrea@plushreupholstery.com.

This is just a snapshot of the projects we have on going at Woodford.
There are lots of traditional projects:

Kate is sewing springs in place in her overstuffed Victorian nursing chair. She is sewing the bridal ties in place ready for the first stuffing.

Sara is hand sewing in the back of the wing on her wingback armchair. 

Hilary is applying the piped edge to her nursing chair - she has created a fluted effect on the seat by sewing channels in the fabric stuffed with wadding. 

Sue has finished the seat of her midcentury chair - we reconstructed the seat from the sprung box to upholstered finish. Sue is using a different fabric on the seat back - will show more next week.

Lisa is patiently lining up the springs on her chaise - this has been hand painted with annie sloan painted - red with beige over and waxed with a clear wax.  This is going to be a labout of love ..

Jayne has sewn in the springs on her Edwardian armchair, with a caned edge to the front, and finished the arms to hessian - I will show the next few stages in the next blog - sewing the arm fronts and taking the arms to calico.  The arms are very tricky - this is Jayne's first go at upholstering arms.

And, finally, Kate has finished her dining room chairs - a set of chairs with different velvet covers.  It is a shame you cannot see how vibrant the teal velvet is - just gorgeous.

Will post more soon ...promise :)

Great start to the classes in Woodford this year. We have a wonderful set of students, and I feel it is going to be a good year.

A few students have finished off projects from last year: Lisa is modelling Jenny's wingback armchair in Pink chenille, and Lisa's own 1930's armchair is next door finished in a warm tweed check. Graduated with style!

Other projects have have just started include a parker knoll - plans to finish this in a deconstructed style; a comfy bedroom chair with buttoned seat and back; a beautiful Edwardian fireside armchair with sprung base; a sprung double ended bench finished in satin; a pin-cushion style chair with fixed base; and a modern wingback armchair finished in a cream chenille.  We have a mixture of really interesting projects.

Will keep you posted on everyone's process ... 

I am delighted to announce a new class on Tuesday afternoon in Woodford. 

Lots of hard work, but lots of fun, had at the Woodford Upholstery Summer class this August.

This is just a snapshot of some of the projects brought to the summer class this year.

With the sun streaming through the windows, tea and fresh (with biscuits of course!) flowing to keep everyone refreshed and motivated we all had a fun and productive day.

There were regular students from the weekly classes, but we were delighted to see new students joining us to try out the craft of upholstery.

Sue Morris, experienced upholsterer, also joined the group this year as a tutor and with two of us supporting the group, we saw real progress being made.

 We were also delighted that Tom and Zoe of Agapanthus Interiors of Stockport, also joined us this week. They worked as a team to restore a beautiful Victorian nursing chair - here they are replacing worn and damaged webbing with new.

Jayne, a regular and experienced upholstery student, started a new project of what initially looked like an overstuffed edwardian armchair, but once the 3 layers of fabric were removed revealed a beautiful 1940's art deco chair frame. Half the fun is seeing what lies beneath!

Sara, regular student, also started a new project - a modern wingback armchair. The foam is in good condition so we are refreshing the foam with polyester wadding before applying the top fabric. 

Gweywen, new to upholstery, starts with a perfect first project - a traditionally upholstered drop-in seat. Here she is tying in the hair.

One class left - next week, so will post more then - everyone enjoy your summer :)