Bottom falling out of wing chair. HELP!

The old strapping has disintegrated and the springs are falling out of ye olde family heirloom chair. We have a lot of company coming and no one will be able to sit in the chair. I don't know how they got it into the living room way back when, but it doesn't fit through the door to get it out so I'm stuck with it. I need a quick fix. I'd hate to put a sign up that says Do No Sit In This Chair Unless You Want to End Up on the Floor.


Ignore the bad upholstery job I did. When we moved into the family homestead the chair came with the house. All I did was recover it. The estimates to have it professionally done were out of our price range. Now I'm stuck. Any advice on a diy project that I could work on before the 25th???

 

That title had me going for a minute...

 

My bottom would be falling out if I sat in it!

 

My dad just cut a piece of plywood and fitted it to the bottom when we had a chair do this . You couldn't see it and it lasted forever . It may not be fancy , but it worked !

 

That strapping is still available.

 

The plywood should work OK. The bottom of the springs are sewn to the straps so I would just leave the straps on to hold them all in place. I would screw the plywood to the bottom so that it does not pull out. This is not the ideal way to fix this but it should work.

Replacing the straps without removing the upholstery would not make a strong enough repair since you would need to tack them to the bottom where they can easily pull out. Ideally, the straps should be attached up to the sides of the frame.

 

I suggested a piece of plywood and my husband was horrified. He thought it would ruin the chair. Considering his mother let her cats shred the upholstery to pieces for forty years before we got it, not much worse could happen.

 

Yipes!!!!

 

I love the chair and don't want to ruin it, but it's too darn big to sit around as a piece of unusable décor. I'm gonna go for the plywood.

 

twenty years ago we had an estimate of $1800 to reupholster it. I wouldn't want to know what they'd charge today. While we're here, any ideas on age? She always said it was her grandfathers which would put it mid to late 1800s. Those front legs don't look that old, but maybe they were replaced?

 

Really hard to tell age on upholstered furniture while it is covered. The casters indicate late 19th - early 20th century.

 

Hi Bev,
I had two wing chairs reupholstered two years ago. They cost 250 plus the fabric.
You need to check again. I think the fabric was 200 bucks.
greg

 

That might be due to location , Greg . Here in n. fla , I wanted to get a loveseat recovered and it was $600 , and that was if I provided fabric ! AND it was at a junior college because everyone else was way higher . Im guessing her chair needs to be totally rebuilt ?

 

Is there a trade school nearby that might tackle the job????

 

Nope. I'm tackling the jog. I'll make a paper pattern and get the men to cut out the plywood on their handy-dandy table saw or whatever they have.

 

Just sayin' - if you want to hijack this thread and digress, go ahead. It doesn't bother me.

 

Bev, when we fixed a small love seat, not only did we use the plywood on the bottom, we cut a piece to place under the cushion. It still felt a bit saggy with just the piece on the bottom. When we put the second piece under the cushion, the saggy feeling went away. The piece under the cushion wasn't secured, it just floated there. I also covered the bottom piece with an inexpensive piece of muslin fabric before we attached it so it wouldn't stand out.

 

I only have until the 25th to do this - along with work and all the other things I have to get done before we're inundated with visitors. I'll post a pic when I'm done.