The Before & After!
Have a look here if you want to see the stripping apart.
And have a look here if you want to see how we built it up again.



Sunday afternoon, time to get busy with the Postal Chair, we started on last weekend. You might be wondering we we’ve called it a ‘postal chair’. Ever since a Dutch fashion designer made jackets from old postal bags I’ve been fantasising about using them too. And a project like this is perfect for it! Before we started cutting and stapling, we filled some of the holes in the wood and gave it a good bees waxing.
In Utrecht we bought the fabric (8€ a meter), and new reupholstering nails and strips. Friday I bought new foam in Brussels (2.5 cm thick). So we’re ready to go!
We cut the fabric using the old fabric as a template (just to be sure we added a couple of centimetres on either side). The first part we stapled down was the back side of the back of the chair (makes sense right?).
Tom then stapled a piece of cardboard (or singleplex?) over it. If you look closely you can see the fabric of the back of the back sticking out underneath. We used spray glue to stick a layer of foam to the back and the seat. Over that we placed the fabric, pulled it tight, and stapled it down.
Because of the thickness of the foam we had some trouble pressing it down, folding the edges and pulling it tight. Luckily we found a method that worked for us. We would fold the fabric and pin it in position, then I would push down the foam with a strong metal strip, and Tom would have little trouble stapling it down in a straight line. Over the staples we hammered the nail strips.
In our next post we’ll show the Before & After!
Last night when I was soaking a blue stained white shirt in chlorine, it occurred to me that I should give dyeing fabric another shot. After the debacle of trying to dye the couch green – I ended up replacing the covers all together, I should really give it another shot. However I was not prepared to lay down another 9 euro’s for a package of dye. So, I hit google in search of natural dyes. My mother used to dye wool in her hippy years, meaning it should be possible. I found a couple of recipes using either vinegar or salt as a fixing agent, and various types of food and herbs as dyes. I even found a pretty good chart of what (easy) foodstuffs give which result (from Anjou).
This morning I pulled an old cotton pillowcase from the closet to give it a try. Since it had been used before I decided only to hand wash it briefly. Than I brought 1 cup of vinegar (the cheep one), 1/2 cup of sea salt, and four cups of water to a boil and added the pillowcase. Every recipe I encountered said to let the fabric boil for an hour.. I’m still waiting for that now. By the way, vinegar really stinks when boiled.
After thoroughly rinsing the pillowcase, I brought some more water to a boil and added about 1/2 cup of tumeric. I put in the pillowcase and stirred it through for about ten minutes. After that I rinsed it and dried it inside.
The color is really amazing! However I’m still unsure if the color will keep. I’ve been scouring the internet to find a way to fix the color, but no luck so far. We’ll be testing it out over the next couple of weeks, and if the color sticks we’ll have a winner method!
Last weekend when we were geocaching around Ribemont, we encountered the remnants of the abbey of Saint-Nicolas-aux-Bois. It used to be a Benedictine abbey, building was started around 1024. Today, parts of the buildings date from the 15th century, including the great tower with the two turrets and the (now caved in) main hall (source).
The abbey around 1660.
The abbey around1869.
Today the abbey looks rather different, the main hall has caved in and so has the chapel. Most of the exterior buildings are still in good shape and inhabited. I just think t is a great shame that the main building has not been restored, or kept in the first place.
Now that my exams are over and some of the overall stress has subdued a bit we decided it was time to try out our new folding trailer (I don’t think it has a word in English, in Dutch it’s ‘vouwwagen’, in Flemmish ‘plooikar’). This is what I’m talking about:
It starts out looking like a normal trailer.. and if you open it and piece it together it looks pretty much like a small palace.
Doesn’t that look amazing? We were the only ones on the camping. We prefer camping places provided by a commune (Camping Municipal), they are usually cheap, clean, and children free (no pools or entertainment). This time we went to Ribemont in the north of France, a little village in the middle of the French countryside. In my next post (coming up soon I hope) I’ll show some pictures from the region.
This was the first time camping for little Amat, she did really well. Although she does not understand being on a leash at all, she does not mind it either. Just like she doesn’t mind geocaching, and making long walks.. although it is nice if the Big Human (aka Tom) carries you for a bit when you are very very very tired...