You can see that the finish is really worn and the canvas is faded. But they have potential. I mean just picture a living room with these chairs as occasional seats or dining chairs, and they could be easily folded and stowed away when not needed.
They are be great for both indoor and outdoor seating. This pic was taken by ChocolateHoney's blog from his visit to a restaurant in Tanzania.
I knew the canvas needed to look more presentable so I fixed some holes ad tears with my sewing machine after I stripped them off the chairs (The seat portion was tacked down so I had to pull them out).
I really like the darker wood finish so I sanded down the old finishing on my chairs. This took days, outside the sweltering summer heat as I was living in Georgia at the time. But it was well worth it!
After all that sanding, I really wanted to get things going; I decided to use a stain with polyurethane in order to do 2 steps at once. I got Minwax at Home Depot - Bombay Mahogany
I used the a good quality brush. This stuff gets thick so be prepared to deal with messes, but it does the job well. I got into all the corners, and it covered even the areas that the sander didn't get.
As I was waiting for the first coat to dry, I machine washed the canvas. They were looking really faded so I used Rit dye in dark brown.
The canvas was a faded dark green so I had no idea how it was gonna come out. It turned out to be a grayish olive color that contrasted beautifully with the new finish.
I did a second coat of the polyurethane. Since it was summer, drying time was pretty fast. A couple of days outside and they were good to go!
So here is the final outcome!
This is just one of the four chairs, it looks much like the chairs in the restaurant in Tanzania.
..and a closer view of both the wood and canvas tones.
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