How to Measure to Recover Chair Seats

Recover your dining room chairs to give them a new lease of life.

You can recover a dinning room chair seat with less than 1 yard of fabric. Chair seats are the most economical place to add that special $50-a-yard designer fabric. So, giving your dining room chairs a facelift doesn't mean spending a fortune. Measuring correctly will allow you to purchase the exact amount of fabric you need, preventing wasted fabric and saving money.

Things You'll Need

• Screwdriver
• Tape measure

Instructions

1. Turn the chair over and remove the screws with a screwdriver. Remove the cushion and place it, bottom side up, on a table.

2. 

   Correct type of tape measure.

   Align the edge of the tape measure with the edge of the fabric on the underside of the cushion at the widest point. Run the tape measure under the cushion and measure around the cushion to the other fabric edge. Add 1 inch to this measurement to allow ½ inch of fabric to be folded under on each edge. This is your width measurement.

3. Repeat Step 2, starting with the back edge of the fabric and measuring to the front edge. Add 1 inch to this measurement. This is your depth measurement.

4. Divide the width of your fabric by the width measurement. If the result is more than 2, you can cover two chairs with each width of fabric. For example if your fabric is 45 inches wide and your width measurement is 21 inches, you can cover two cushions per width. If your width measurement is 24 you can only cover one cushion per width.

5. Divide the number of chairs you wish to cover by the number of chairs you can cover with each width of fabric. Round up to the nearest whole number. For example if you can cover two chairs per width you will need thee widths to cover five chairs.

6. Multiply the number widths needed by your depth measurement to determine how many inches of fabric you will need. For example if you need three widths of fabric and your depth measurement is 24 inches, you will need 72 inches of fabric.

7. Divide the number of inches you need by 36 to determine how many yards to buy. For example if you need 72 inches, you would buy 2 yards.