Hastings' Upholstery: First Class

What a neat school this is! Old, uneven wooden floors and old bench stations that have supported countless projects. They teach, amongst many other subjects, woodworking classes from children to adults and their unfinished projects are all around the room on shelves and tucked into corners.

The first step is to strip the chair of its old fabric, underlayers and staples and tacks. He said the decorative tacks on my chair, which were brass, were very old and appeared original. The flat tacks beneath the fabric were sometimes difficult to remove and there had to be a hundred tacks altogether. I only bled a couple of times but I no longer have any fingernails.

Once everything is removed, we checked to see what joints were loose and needed to be glued. This was not a neat process - it is easy to ding the wood trying to pry the joints apart. I commented that I was making a mess with the glue but he said that I wasn't messy enough. In the end there was glue dripping form every joint and I broke one corner (well, split it good) while tightening the clamps. Teacher to the rescue (he's kind of a bull in a china closet, but he is, as one former student commented online, a "hilarious and ridiculously talented" teacher. He poured glue in the crevices created by the damage and put a few c-clamps on it and that was it. Below are pictures at different stages during the class. Can't wait for the next one!