DIY Painted Bentwood Chairs

When Johnny and I got married, I had the good fortune of getting seven hand-me-down Bentwood chairs from my parents.  They were originally my grandmother's, and I asked her about them yesterday.  She said that she bought them from a pool hall in Oklahoma City for $2.50 a piece forever ago.  She brought them home and painted them apple green and put blue and white seats on them, tied in the back with big bows.  She said it was a "jolt" when you looked at them.  Nana couldn't remember the other colors that she had them painted, but there is evidence of that apple green, a Tiffany blue, and a bright red.  When my parents got them, my mom had them stripped down to their original wood, and we used them as kitchen chairs until I was in middle school.

Now for the present.  I noticed in a Crate and Barrel catalog awhile ago that they were selling painted Bentwood chairs for over $100 a pop.  A bright red one caught my eye, so I decided to repaint our chairs Ladybug Red by Martha Stewart.

First I sanded them down.  This really didn't take as long as I thought it would.

Then I primed them.  There are two issues here.  One: My grandpa said I should have used some kind of wood sealer before painting them to help the paint cover everything better.  Oops.  Two: I should have been less sloppy with my primer and actually tried to cover all the wood.  Oops.  You'll notice that one seat isn't painted.  It splintered awhile ago, so I'm waiting for my grandpa to cut me a new circle and attach it.

Now, I wouldn't normally use a Martha Stewart color, and I certainly wouldn't use Behr paint from Home Depot.  We're a Sherwin Williams family, you see.  But Sherwin Williams doesn't have shopping carts that you can strap very independent "I walk by myself!" kids into, so we had to go to Home Depot.  This picture is after one coat...and I stopped taking pictures after that because I did something like five coats.  Honestly, they still need one or two more coats, but I got bored.  

And here's the somewhat finished product!  

The cushions were grey cushions that I bought awhile ago at Ikea (circular cushions are very difficult to find).  I got some fabric from Hobby Lobby for 40% off and recovered the cushions the same way you would cover a pillow.

While I was sewing the cushion covers together, I stuck in some apple green ribbon to tie the cushions to the chairs.

I severely underestimated the amount of ribbon I would need for each chair, and now I have to go back to Hobby Lobby to get enough for the last three.  "Story of my life," said Nana when I told her.

Anyway, I'm really happy with them.  Overall I spent less then $100 on supplies, so that's seven chairs for the price of one!  And here's a little known fact about Bentwood chairs: My sister said that they were the first mass produced chair in the United States.  So there you go.