Replacing Fabric on Outdoor Chairs

I am so excited to share this post because I LOVE a project where I get to use new tools! I thought this project would be pretty straight-forward, but it ended up being a little tricky!

I started off with my weekly trip to the thrift store! I actually got to go by myself, so there was no begging for toys or worrying my kids would break something! It was basically like a little vacation! I happened to stumble upon two outdoor chairs with great structure and that were in great shape!

I thought I could unscrew the fabric and screw more fabric on, but it was actually held on by aluminum rivets. My husband helped me to drill out the old rivets (which isn’t good for my street cred, but whatever)! Here are pictures of the rivets before and the chairs with the fabric gone.

Next I cut out a pattern using the old fabric. Basically I laid the old fabric (on a fold) on the new fabric and cut around leaving 2″ of extra fabric to give me plenty of room for seams and mistakes!

I cut out 2 pieces for each part of the chair. I put 2 pieces of fabric right-sides-together and got out my sewing machine!

I sewed around all the sides except for the top and then turned the fabric right side out. Then I sewed around to create some pockets for some supports that I cut out of the old fabric.

Then I folded the open top over and sewed a pocket there and slipped the last support through.

Now comes the fun part! I was ready to attach it to the chair! I got out my riveter (and 3/16″ aluminum rivets) and got to work!

First, you put the thick part of the rivet through the fabric into the hole in the chair. The end that looks like a nail goes up.

Then the riveter fits over and I squeezed the handles together until it popped.

Here is the rivet all finished! One down, a bunch more to go!

After I got all the rivets in it looked like this!

Aren’t they so pretty! I really am so pleased with how they turned out! It took me about 4 hours to get these chairs done and it took about $30 for the chairs and the fabric! I think it is a great deal for 2 chairs that are this cute!

Please ignore all the surroundings! This is just the first step to make my backyard more mom-friendly this spring! My dream is to sit outside and watch my kids play while I read a good book! How have you decorated your yard to get ready for spring? I would love to hear from you! At the bottom of the page, you can find all of my social media accounts so you don’t miss anything!