Office Chair Makeover

I am starting to get in the mood to do a few fun craft projects for my classroom.  I saw a picture on pinterest of how to re-cover an office chair and give it a whole new look.  I don't sit down a lot in my classroom, except during reading small groups and Tejas Lee testing.  When I do sit down, though,  I really don't appreciate the incredibly uncomfortable chairs I have to choose from.  So I decided to try out this craft project and it turned out awesome!  I am looking forward to having a comfortable chair to sit it when I need it =).

First, I bought an office chair from a family friend for $10 (thanks Karen!).  Here is the before picture.

The most difficult part of this project was taking the chair apart.  The bottom was easier, as it just unscrews.  I googled around and found out that the top part is supposed to "pop off".  Sort of true, but not quite that easy.  I put a screwdriver in between the plastic pair and the padding, and was able to pop it out but not remove it completely.  (My dog was VERY curious about this project, isn't she cute!)

It turns out my husband had to help me because hidden on the back of a chair behind a plastic piece that popped off was a part you had to unscrew.  After that, the top section came off no problem.  It took me awhile to disassemble the whole chair, but it was a fun undertaking.  After I got it somewhat disassembled, I cut off the red fabric with scissors.  Some people actually removed the staples from the back, but I didn't go that far.  I just cut around where the staples were and left a little bit of fabric on the back.  It was way less time consuming and didn't change the outcome of the project.

The last and easiest step was to staple on the new fabric with a staple gun, and then just reassemble the chair.  I wasn't worried about it being perfect, and it wasn't hard to staple the fabric.  If you're wondering how much fabric to buy, I bought a yard of nice, thick fabric from Hobby Lobby and it was on sale for $6.  It was cutting it close, though, so I might suggest a yard and a half.  I chose animal print because my classroom is safari themed.  So, here is the finished project, and it only cost me $16 to complete!!  I had so much fun rolling around on it at my house last night =).

I would love to hear of any fun craft projects you are doing for your classroom-- thanks for stopping by!!