This project has been a huge dose of serotonin to me – I get the same burst of excitement seeing these photos as my kids do eating their Sunday sundaes. It feels chemical, truly. Over the years I’ve shown many hoarding tendencies – you don’t become a stylist without an extreme love of “stuff”. Vintage quilts have always been something that I’ve let myself buy even if “I didn’t need it” (vintage fabric is generally on that list, TBH). I grew up quilting in 4-H so I know the labor, love, and time that goes into all quilts and it’s just hard for me to let them stay at a thrift store, sad, discarded, and unloved in their current life. So for this project, I took all my quilt collection from thrift stores, Etsy, and flea markets (some splurgy, some pennies) and had this fantasy of reupholstering all the benches, back cushions, and mushroom stools in this craft shed (Formerly called the art barn). It might be one of my favorite things I’ve ever done in my life. If you remember me for one thing, let this totally unnecessary (but already SO USED) fantasy room be it 🙂
I started by laying them all out – I wanted to triple-check that I was going to love this vibe (and that it would be worth the quilt sacrifice and the financial investment of the upholstery). Once laid out, I was giddy with excitement. Freaking out even. Elliot came in and squealed. Even Brian knew it. Of course, I realized that I needed much more than I had (especially if I wanted to do it on both top and bottom thus making them reversible). I then went on Etsy and bought more that were just quilt toppers (more affordable AND easier to upholster).
I had a real mix of patterns, styles, and colors (more than what is above). Some were just quilt toppers (that I hoarded to turn into curtains, I think?), others that were more 80s design (square with yarn knots, thick padding), some postage stamp (tiny squares), some Irish chains, some larger flowers and stars, etc. As I collect, I usually buy based on pattern and color, but honestly, I am such a quilt enthusiast that I would also buy any that were really affordable at thrift stores even if I didn’t love the color because I knew I could dye them. Since this was going to be for a kids’ craft space (and our flex space for work and shoots) I also wanted them to be relatively stain and dirt-friendly – so I put the ones with more negative space as the backs and for the seat we intentionally did one side in a less precious quilt so that it could be flipped to be more kid-friendly if needed.
As a reminder, the space was a dingy barn that we clad in pine (added insulation and some basic electrical) and I found these built-in benches from Wayfair (the almost perfect size!) to create a built-in banquet. The black and metal stuff on the wall will make sense a bit later 🙂
Not Exactly A DIY – I Hired Out!
There was no way I could do this myself and honestly, this is one of those opportunities I knew I could take to support local artist businesses as well as give them some awesome photos. I already knew who I would hire for this – Anne, from ADF Upholstery. She did our first quilted mushroom stool and has a dope booth at Urbanite. She’s a french woman who has such an artful eye and I frankly wanted that eye on my project 🙂 Anne is a real textile artist, and I knew that she could help me execute this in a way that would be better than me doing it by myself (and yes, I pay full price – a privilege I am grateful to be able to do at this point in my life). Anne came over and we laid them all out, she took notes on where everything was to go, helped troubleshoot the size of the back cushions, and then left with everything. It was a real investment and I felt in really good hands with Anne (and highly recommend her specifically for more design-oriented upholstery jobs – i.e. not your run-of-the-mill ottomans, although I’m sure she’d be great at that, too:)).
A few weeks later she came by and installed them. We designed the back to sit on french cleats (and still allow access to the outlets which we planned specifically to be above the benches so we could use the sewing machine, glue guns, and 3D printer easily. This kind of back cushion is great design-wise, but if this were for a dining bench know that it kinda pushes you out a bit (i.e. not that ergonomic) and therefore you’d want a deeper bench. We knew this but for our purposes, we wanted this look (and again, we wanted easy access to the outlets, which we use all the time). I think a squared-off version of this might be ultimately more practical for comfort for a dining bench, but again, for crafting we LOVE it.
See Them In Action
I’m truly obsessed with how it came out. The ONLY thing I would have done differently is put a more visually heavy quilt on the back wall – something with more punch. I specifically chose that white and green one there because I wanted the green to balance out the green sectional that is on the opposite wall, but I think a punchier color would have pulled the eye back there more. Literally nobody that comes in understands why I have this slight regret and if I were a normal person I wouldn’t even call it out, but that’s not how I roll. Let me be clear, I love it so much that I don’t really care.
We really mixed them up. We put our more favorites up the front and the ones I liked the least along the back cushion (although I really did like them all so win-win).
I originally bought the flower quilt topper ($15 at a thrift store) to put on each top of the mushroom stools, but we ended up keeping it as a cushion cover instead.
How sweet are all of these stools? ADF makes these mushroom stools (you can choose to swivel them or not). She specializes in upholstering with quilts (most upholsterers would look at you like you were a bit nuts if you dropped off 15 quilts and asked them to do this). I love all four of those patterns so much for different reasons – the postage stamp has so much energy and so many patterns – all hand-stitched!! The denim one with the triangles is me if I were a quilt. The Irish chain is so classic – I can’t pass one up if/when I find them. And the larger square one is out of men’s shirts, feels very 80s, and was so soft – it reminded me most of the quilts I made when I was little, with the quilting at the edge of each square.
The back cushions are hung on a cleat and the black tape-looking things you saw above was velcro that Anne added I think so they would hang more flat and stay put.
I’m SO excited to show you the finished room (coming soon, next week I think). A huge thanks to Anne of ADF Upholstery for making my quilting dreams come true. It feels more like an art installation and this is exactly what I wanted for an inspiriting art/craft space for our family. Every time I walk in (which is very often – Elliot has claimed this room with her friends as their space) I feel so proud and giddy. The walls are so calm and then your eye just dances around the quilts, delighted by the mix of colors and patterns. I hope you like it 🙂
*Photos by Kaitlin Green