Stained Bench Makeover

While shopping at a local salvage shop one day way back last year I spotted this stool. This is when I was casually looking for furniture to inhabit my soon-to-be apartment. At $7, sitting there just crying out to be rescued I figured it couldn’t be that hard a job, so I brought it home.

First I took off the seat and removed the old fabric and batting. The seat is simply screwed in each corner and the fabric came of easily with some pliers. Then I started the sanding job. The flat parts with the hand sander, the curved parts by hand.

I decided to stain this black, so I used Minwax oil-based Pre-Stain Wood Conditioner and let that dry before I put on the first coat. It wasn’t the color I wanted so I put on 2 more coats of Minwax Wood Stain in Ebony and let it dry. See the photo on the right after the first coat.

After about 2 weeks of letting it sit there, it didn’t seem like it was completely dry to the touch, but I put on the Minwax oil-based polyurethane anyway. Big mistake. Actually the first mistake was not wiping the stain off after I put it on. Minor detail right? No. It was soaking well into the wood and looked good so I guess I thought I didn’t need that step. It can’t be skipped because when the poly dried 2 days later, there was a white milky layer on most parts of the stool.

Ruined? Not exactly. The only thing I could do was sand off the white parts (which were most of the stool) and start over. So I did, hence my two refinishing’s tale.

The fabric I chose for the top is from JoAnns, it’s called Pen Pal and I got it at about $13.00. I cut a piece of high density foam for the top and stapled the new fabric to the back. Pretty easy. And now here is my new twice-refinished $7 stool.

The finish is obviously done by hand, the color waivers at the edges, but I like it. What do you think?