Use it up, Wear it out, Make it do or Do without

Its nearly the Spring season and what does that mean? A spring clean! Everyone thinks of a spring clean as getting rid of the old and changing to the new, well not anymore. I have various tips to change what you have into inventive, unique and pretty amazing stuff. Whether it be furniture, clothes or getting crafty there are plenty of ways to get your creative juices flowing.

I had a second hand, very ordinary looking ottoman which I was dying to make more exciting. Here’s the result!

All I had to do was sand it down, prime and paint with wood paint. I even made the star stencil myself just by cutting a star shape out of cardboard. Totally transformed!
If your interested in giving tired looking chairs an uplift then look no further. I had never re-covered chairs before but I gave it a go and it was so easy!

I had material from ‘made to measure’ cushions which in fact weren’t ‘made to measure’ so decided to use this to recover my dining room chairs. The chairs were getting tatty and a very boring beige colour so I decided to jazz them up a bit.

Have you guessed I love orange yet? All you need is a screwdriver, a staple gun, scissors and material and away you go!

Another wee project I did to change the look of traditional to modern.

So there you have it. A few looks to change something that’s old, boring or simply not your style into something you can be proud of.

Spring Cleaning Helpful Hints

• Split your goods into categories e.g. CHARITY SHOP, RECYCLE, GIVE AWAY, UPCYCLE. LANDFILL must be the last resort!!
• Sell your stuff on internet sites such as eBay, Facebook and Gumtree or put it on Freecycle and give it to someone for free
• Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today. If you leave it lying about for ages it will end up back where it came from.
• Don’t be afraid to just get stuck in.

For help with upcycling why not try watching Kirstie’s Home-made home and Kirstie’s Vintage Home on channel 4 these shows have great ideas.