Before and After: Antique Sofa

When we were preparing to move from Idaho to California we sold some of our furniture. One of the things we got rid of was a sofa that we had upstairs in our bonus room because we weren't sure if we'd even need it in our next house. Turns out we did, so I started looking around. I really wanted a sofa bed, like this one from Ikea, because we don't have a proper guest room here.

I searched several local stores but couldn't find anything even close. And eventually I got over the whole sofa bed idea and just started looking for a regular sofa like the one above and still came up empty. Then I got over the whole "spend a bunch of money on a brand spankin' new sofa" idea and finally remembered seeing a cool old couch at the Salvation Army.
At the time it was priced at $100, then 2 weeks later when I was on my sofa hunt I went back and it was still there and had been marked down to $49. I texted my husband a photo and told him I could re-cover, it so we picked it up and brought it home.

The velvet was horribly faded, and the wood needed some touching up, but I loved the details like the scrolled arms and the clawed feet.


This shows just how faded the fabric on the back of the couch had gotten. The blue at the bottom of the photo is the wrong side of the fabric and the dingy cream color is the right side. It was pretty once, but not anymore.

I ripped the velvet off and got ready to work on the wood. This is a product I've never used before but have been wanting to try.
The Antique Walnut shade seemed pretty close to the current wood color, so on it went and it worked WONDERS. Seriously, if you have a wooden piece that needs a facelift, use this. You don't need to strip off the old finish or anything. Just brush this on like paint, let it dry 6 hours, rub the surface with very fine steel wool, brush on another coat and that's it!

Here's the fruits of my week's worth of labor.

Hardware store drop cloth was my fabric of choice because it's durable, inexpensive, imperfect and casual so it brings down the "fussiness" of the couch.


This was a pretty big project, but after redoing my brother's couch last summer I knew I could handle it. It would have been infinitely faster and easier if I had a good staple gun, but don't get me started on that. I hate my staple gun with all my heart right now, and I'll just leave it at that.
I'm really happy with our new couch, and it seems like a good fit for our front room. Here's a little tour. This is the view from our front door into the living/dining room.


We have our computer in there, too, so it also serves as an office.

We recently acquired this piano from a friend and I'm really excited to find a bench for it and get it cleaned up for playing.

This is the view from behind the sofa. Should I paint that pair of armchairs? I can't decide.

So there you go. I love when I get to do big, dramatic projects, but I think that will probably be it for a while. There will definitely be more furniture refinishing going on, but probably no more sofas for a while!