1960s Era Ottoman Makeover

My friend Dianna is trying to clean out her garage and for good—or maybe not so good if it ends up in my garage—she’s cleaning out some of her things to me. She started making over this sturdy, heavy-duty well-made ottoman recently and didn’t get it finished so I got it.

The original covering was one of those lovely large-scale plaid patterns in various shades of avocado and harvest gold. Dianna started the job by covering the top with this stripe.

 

She gave me enough striped fabric to finish it, but it was sitting around while I covered these ladder-back chairs and I realized that fabric also matched. So that’s what I used to cover the base.

Looks pretty good huh?

If I had gimp, I would have added it around the seam but I didn’t have the right color on hand. I did, however, have a third scrap of fabric in similar colors.

My first plan was to stitch the contrast fabric around the ottoman, but stitching into the tight upholstery was not an easy task. After a half-hour I’d only managed to attach a few inches so I decided to sleep on it and come up with Plan B.

Plan B was belt loops.

I cut a long strip of the striped fabric and stitched the raw edges inside and then instead of attaching single loops I wound it around the contrast fabric and nailed it into place on the backside.

The only thing left to do is attach the casters to the bottom. I’ll get those from Dianna and finish it up tomorrow.

This ottoman was literally headed to the dump before Dianna  pulled it back from the brink. It was fun to finish the transformation and come up with something that has a lot more years of use left in it.

One ugly ottoman, plus three fabric remnants added up to this.

I have three more ottomans that need the same upgrade. Let me know if you’re in the market for something like this and want a particular color or fabric. This one is at the flea market at the Cleveland County Fairgrounds this weekend.

What do you think?

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