Finally I was able to replace my wobbly little dining chairs with solid wood chairs, thanks to Ana’s Harriet Chair plan. For this build, I made a few mods from Ana’s plan: added a padded seat, made the chair 2” wider, and substituted a slatted back. Used select pine 1x2 instead of 2x2 (really liked that look in the inspiration chair) and used 1x3 for the 2 inner slats on the backs. Also added a few more cross supports. Instead of predrilling pocket holes and hiding the screws, I chose to use the round washer head self-tapping screws and left them visible. This saved time on having to pre-drill and fill screw holes, but also thought the exposed screw heads made a nice decorative element. The seats are covered with 1” thick high density foam, batting, and outdoor fabric. The first of the 4 chairs took longest to make (I made and corrected all my mistakes on that one). The remaining 3 went a lot faster (took about 11 hours total for building the 4 chairs, and 12 hrs total for finishing them). The changes/steps I used are documented in a .pdf file in the second plan post linked above. Ana, thank you for all your wonderful plans. You rock!!!
Estimated Cost
Cost: $230 for 4 chairs, which came to about $58 per chair. For 4 chairs: $127 for lumber & screws, $28 for paint, and $70 for chair fabric and foam. (fasteners, glue and sandpaper not included in cost, those were already on hand). I was able to build all 4 chairs for the price it would have cost for just one from the furniture store.
Estimated Time Investment
Week Long Project (20 Hours or More)
Finish Used
Finished with Benjamin Moore Aura satin, in Wenge, 3 coats . Rubbed down all the chairs with Pledge after the paint dried. (I had attempted waxing one of them, but that took way too long for me!) The seat is covered in outdoor fabric (all the fabric and the foam were on sale for half-price @ Joann fabrics – score!!!).
Recommended Skill Level
Intermediate