The Leather Chair

For the brown leather chair, I made several attempts to find thin brown faux leather.  I had found some fabulous red faux leather by LuvFabrics when I was making the mid-century bar in my Merrimack, but couldn’t find it in brown.  One version was too thick; another that I thought was exactly what I wanted ended up being metallic bronze!  So, in my first try for the brown leather chair, I used some material I had purchased from Joann.  It’s actually fabric, but has the look of aged, cracked brown leather.  I’ve seen it used to spectacular effect in 1:12 scale.  However, in 1:24 scale it just looked . . . odd. 

The pattern was a combination of the upholstered chair and the Lisa chair from One Inch Minis.  Instead of wrapping the bottom and covering the front of the arms with fabric, I used real wood scrapbook paper that I had stained.  I was pretty happy with the pattern, but the stain could have been a bit darker on this version, and the legs are too long.  I also didn’t get quite the tufting effect I wanted.  Back to the drawing board.

Since I couldn’t find the faux leather I wanted, I ended up getting an inexpensive pair of used leather gloves from eBay.  The glove leather was a bit thicker than I would have liked, but it was soft and pliable, so I gave it a try.

Much better, I think.  Instead of using batting on the seat and back, I used craft foam.  Using a leather punch, I punched holes in the craft foam where the tufting would be, to give the leather some place to sink into. 

 I stained the wood scrapbook paper with a darker stain, and I cut my legs (fancy toothpicks superglued to flattish round beads and painted) a little shorter.  For the buttons, the leather was too thick to use, so I painted a sheet of plain paper with brown satin-finish paint.  This allowed me to use the tiny dots from a border craft punch to punch even smaller circles than I could with the leather punch; I then “rounded” them on my craft foam according to Kris’ instructions.  

I think I can live with this version.