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There are times when customizing pieces is a lonely business. First, the voice inside my head is a real pain in the a**. Then there are the looks you get when you tell people what you’re planning to do to refinish a piece.
Sometimes it’s the purists who glare at you menacingly when you tell them you’re planning to paint over wood. WOOD! Are you mad! Why would you paint that gorgeous wood! Um, because it doesn’t fit my design aesthetic and I want it to be brighter and cheerful. They harrumph and continue to glare.
Then there are the well-meaning friends who like your idea but you know what would be better! If you did what they were thinking instead. So much better doncha think? Um, no.
Finally, there are the ones who, when you tell them you’re going to paint a chair mint green and reupholster the seat in purple velvet, look at you with their eyes wide and mouths hanging open. They just can’t see what I’m seeing.
It’s hard to plow ahead and trust your instincts. That’s what I did for this Duncan Phyfe chair. It was in rough shape when I found it and I knew I had to do some major gluing, and filling to correct the damage so leaving it in its original state was not an option (sorry purists).
I glued the parts that separated with my favorite[amazon_textlink asin=’B0000223UV’ text=’ Gorilla Glue ‘ template=’ProductLink’ store=’1512′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’1e957068-4515-11e8-aa35-8fec5627e46b’] and [amazon_textlink asin=’B00CPSJCB8′ text=’clamped ‘ template=’ProductLink’ store=’1512′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’d30df9b7-4518-11e8-91eb-a7b494419f11′]it together until it dried. 
Then I filled the missing sections of the back of the chair with wood putty a. When it was dry I sanded the excess away.
For this chair I wanted a nice minty green color to I chose Junk Gypsy 
Chalk and Clay paint in Landlocked Mermaid which has that amazing vintage mint color that I love.
I had been on a picking weekend with a friend of mine a few weeks before and scored about 4 yards of [amazon_textlink asin=’B00D3TJNOO’ text=’purple velvet’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’1512′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’a8647447-4517-11e8-bfcc-f73ddff263ba’]. In my mind, it was the only fabric I could see on this chair. Yeah, there was more than one stink face aimed in my direction when I told people what I was planning.
I ignored them and that voice in my head that said play it safe, play it safe and plunged ahead. I’m glad I did.
It’s beautiful. Now that it’s done and people can actually see what I saw in my mind they get it now. Now instead of, “oh really?” I hear, “Wow really!”
Sometimes you just have to follow your own vision and trust your design instincts.
Have you ever seen the stink face when you’ve tried to describe your vision? Leave a comment below and let me know how you handled it.
Many blessings!
~s
