TWO FINN JUHL CHAIRS - DOCUMENTING ORIGINAL MATERIALS, AND REUPHOLSTERING

In this Instructable, I document the original materials used in a pair of 1950s Finn Juhl chairs, as I remove the original upholstery and reupholster them. In the course of deconstructing these chairs, we’ll see how mid-century Scandinavian designers used all natural materials to make airy, seemingly minimal chairs that have lasted 70 years.

TOOLS I USED

• Hammer
• Small, thin crowbar
• screwdriver(s)
• Pliers
• Scissors (the good ones, for fabric cutting)
• Utility knife
• Tape measure
• Staple gun and staples
• Screw eyes or screws
• Drill, if repairing seat springs
• If you are stretching the springs, the t-shaped wrench with a hook on it is useful, if you have it (it came with our trampoline kit)
• Heavy cotton upholstery thread
• Curved upholstery needle
• Cotton batting
• Tack strips and/or upholstery tacks
• About 5.5 yards of upholstery fabric
• Button covering kit with #24 (1.4cm) buttons (I used #30, 0.75”, 1.9cm, which looks good too)
• Danish oil, or if you don’t have that, low gloss tung oil
• 0000 steel wool
• Wood stain or wood oil as needed to rejuvenate the wood frame
• Rubber gloves
• Rags

I bought these chairs for my first apartment in the late 1980s, but I think they were made in the 1950s. I was attracted to the craftsmanship, the use of natural materials, and the sleek profile of these chairs. And yes, they are very comfortable to sit in. The fabric was very stained when I bought them, and the fabric covering the front of the seat platform was torn. 

A note on this particular model: I don’t know what it is! If anyone knows the name of this model, please leave it in the comments. Maybe this model never got a nickname, and just has a model number. The frame that holds the seat, and the legs are the same shape as Finn Juhl’s model SW53, made for Soren Willadsen in 1953, but the arms and back shapes are different. It’s also similar to the 48 Chair, which is back in production but my chairs have a homier, less edgy shape. I checked the Finn Juhl website (more on this website later), but they don’t have a full catalog of every model he ever designed, just photos of the models that are back in production. So, please leave a comment if you know the model number for this chair. 

First, a quick look at the overall condition. The first thing that wore out, and was actually torn a bit when I bought the chairs, was the grey fabric covering the frame just below the seat. This is where your legs rub against the frame. These tears got worse over time. I’ll try to address that weak spot as I reupholster. In addition, the grey fabric was very stained when I bought the chairs in the 1980s, and I once scrubbed the fabric with upholstery cleaner. I was able to remove a lot of the staining, but the covering for the metal buttons wore through, and the wool fabric thinned somewhat. Every few years, I rubbed the wood frame with Danish oil. But now, I think we’re at the tipping point where the scars of time disrupt the overall look of the chair. 

Before I remove the original fabric, let’s linger over it one moment: I read years ago that Scandinavian designers who were making modern chairs in the mid-20th century were interested in using all natural materials. They wanted to marry sleek, organic forms with elements directly from nature. This is the case with these chairs, and that is what makes them so attractive. Even as the original wool upholstery wore out, it reminded me of the natural senescence that occurs in my garden at the end of the season. 

The original upholstery was grey wool, in a weave that I’ll call gabardine, for lack of a better term. It reminds me of wool gabardine used in suits because it has this longitudinal grain, but the yarns used in this upholstery fabric are thicker than gabardine for suits. The textile is woven from marled grey wool, and has a thin cotton backing. The third photo in this step shows the original grey fabric on the very back of the chair, where it is not worn from people sitting on it — that photo shows black woolly fibers sticking out of the fabric. The marled yarn and weave give the original fabric a subtle texture. 

I believe the seat covers were replaced, because the wool threads in the seat fabric are thinner than the grey fabric. Also, the padding inside the seat cushion is modern upholstery foam. The green wool gabardine is very lovely, though. It has flecks of gold, brown and orange in it, that catch the light.

I also want to remark on the hand stitching. Perhaps this feature of the original craftsmanship is more apparent now that the fabric has worn thin. The two pieces of fabric covering the chair back (the inside-back, and outside-back, I’m going to call them), are sewn together by hand. I include a couple photos of the subtle rhythm that the hand stitching gives to the outline of the chair back, and there is a photo showing that the stitches are about 0.5 cm in length. Overall, I have always admired how these details (the multicolor grey wool and the hand stitching) give just the right amount of interest to the simple shape of the chair. 

Since I love everything about the original look of these chairs, for decades, I kept my eye out for similar fabric. In the summer of 2021, I was looking at wool upholstery fabric at Denver Fabrics online (denverfabrics.com), and I found a very similar look in a synthetic textile, on clearance. They called it “Pebbled Gray Slub Textured Broken Twill Woven Decorating Fabric,” if you want some search terms to use while looking for similar fabric. They also had a wool crepe textile by JR Scott that had a nice two-tone look, but it was too brown for me. I bought 6 yards of the clearance textile, and I bought a few samples of all-wool textiles too. When my order came in the mail, the synthetic fabric looked so very much like the original, I decided to use it. I purchased 6 yards, but in the end, the chairs and their cushions only needed only about 4 yards of 57”-wide fabric for both of them. 

It was only AFTER I reupholstered the chairs that I found the House of Finn Juhl website (finnjuhl.com). It’s exciting to see that many of Finn Juhl’s furniture designs are back in production, and if you order new chairs or sofas, you can choose your upholstery, from leather to wool, and other textiles. To see what textiles are currently being offered for new chairs, go to https://finnjuhl.com/materials#textiles. I’m not sure if they’ll sell just the upholstery fabric, though, and I didn’t see a light grey wool like the textile on my chairs. 

Before the Aerochair, there were metal springs and burlap. Look at how much you can achieve with wood, springs, and staples. I have to say, though, that most of these springs ripped out over the years, some before I got the chairs in the 1980s, some after. It’s important to repair the springs right away, because if the remaining springs have to take a person’s weight, they tear out even faster. 

The springs have been repaired several ways. The original configuration was to nail the springs to the top of the wood frame with two long staples (3rd photo). The last picture in this section shows how those staples tear out over time. There’s just a few horizontal fibers of wood that hold the spring’s tension, and at some point, they give out. When I bought the chairs, some of the springs had been repaired by placing a screw into the top of the wood frame, and hooking the spring on that. I didn't like that configuration because I worried that the screw head would wear out the bottom of the seat cushion. Also, you have to put the screw in a little bit farther from the frame edge, so you have to stretch the spring a little bit more than it was originally designed for. When it was my turn to periodically repair some of the springs, sometimes I used screws, but other times I put screw eyes into the side of the wood frame. This hopefully spreads the pulling force across more wood fibers. It also puts the spring under a bit less tension, and it puts the repaired spring slightly lower than the other springs, which may not be good. I can’t say which way of repairing these springs is best; I just offer these different factors for you to think about. So far, none of the screws or screw eyes have failed, so these repairs will last for at least 10 years. 

The last photo in this section shows how I used a tool from my kids' trampoline to pull the spring to its new anchor. The springs are really strong and this is a dangerous operation.

As you can see from the first photo in this section, the springs were originally covered with burlap, which was sewn around the outer set of springs. That kept the springs from wearing out the fabric on the bottom of the seat cushion. I’ll show you what I did to replace the burlap and augment the springs’ suspension-ability in a later step. I broke the “all natural materials” rule, but I did recycle! 

Because the chair was more stable while it was still in its frame, I used the thin crowbar to take as many tacks as I could access without denting the chair frame. Then I took the chair out of the frame to get at the rest of the fabric. Don’t use a power drill to remove and replace these screws, use hand power. 

It’s best to take the bottom screws out first. There are 4 7cm-long screws that go through the stretchers into the bottom of the seat frame. Next, I took out the screws in the arms of the chair. The dark wood plugs came out easily. The original ones are nice because they have a mushroom cap shape. One was missing, so at the hardware store, I found a 0.5” (1.27cm) hardwood button that fits loosely into the hole. I stained it to match the others, and at the end of this whole process, I put it in the hole with a little bit of 3M removable adhesive putty. 

Under the wood plug is a long wood screw, which goes through the frame, and through a wood cylinder (exactly 0.5 inches long and about 0.5 inches diameter) that acts as a spacer between the frame and the seat. The screw continues right through the upholstery fabric, and into the back frame. 

While I had the chair upside-down, I noticed a fantastic thing. The gliders on the bottom of the legs seem original. They are a clear, amber color. Did the “all-natural materials” criterion extend all the way down to the chair glides? Are they made from natural resin? Whatever they are made of, I think they have lasted 70 years without a crack!!! Maybe these chairs have lived on carpet most of their lives. I’ve had them on carpet for most of the 30 years I’ve had them. 

In general, when you remove old upholstery, pay attention to the way the fabric pieces are layered. There is an order to what gets put on first, and what gets layered over it. When you put on the new fabric, you put things on in the opposite order in which you removed them. The first layers that you took off will be the last layers you put on. Don’t make the mistake of thinking you can remember how you did it. Take pictures, or make a bullet list of what order you took things off, adding little notes of details you observed as you go. Keep the original pieces of fabric, as they become the pattern for cutting your new pieces of fabric.  

Here are some photos of how the original upholstery went on. It appears that the sides of the seat frame were covered first. A tack strip was used to attach the straight edge, then the outside edges were tacked underneath with small tacks. Then the front of the seat frame was covered. Again, a tack strip was used to attach the inside, straight edge, and small tacks attached the outside edge of fabric to the underside of the seat frame. There was a super-thin layer of cotton batting between the fabric and wood frame. I think there needs to be a bit more padding at the front edge of the seat frame to prevent the fabric from tearing prematurely, in the future. But I also want the front corners to be wrapped really tight, the way the original was. The original upholstery fit the frame like a skin, and I want to replicate that sleek look. One photo in this section shows how the fabric was wrapped under the front corners of the seat. There is a sort of box pleat, but when the chair is upright, the pleats are just below the curve of the frame, out of sight. This artistry is part of the magic of these chairs, which I’m going to try hard to replicate.  

Actually, I think I took the upholstery fabric off in the wrong order. It appears that the outside-back covering should come off first, but I was able to get away with leaving just a fragment of the seat frame cover on, before I moved on to the chair back. 

There was something beautiful about how the outside-back piece curved around and under at the “hips” of the chair, where the back meets the seat. It was so smooth. I’m going to try hard to achieve a similar skin-tight smoothness at this juncture with the new fabric. I took pictures of how the fabric was tacked on at this juncture. Then I pulled out the hand stitches that went up the sides and all around the top seam and found that a thick cotton upholstery thread was used. I found almost identical thread in the drawer of my grandmother’s sewing machine. The original thread did not appear to be shiny, but my grandmother’s spool of thread has a slight sheen. It may be waxed twine, about 1mm thick.  

Under the outside-back fabric, I found a thin, papery layer of cotton batting with very feathered edges. Under the batting was a layer of wood shavings which I think is called excelsior.  Cotton strings were tacked in a loose grid to hold the excelsior in place. Under that was jute webbing woven into an opaque grid. The front buttons were sewn through this jute webbing, which you can see in some of the latter photos. I didn’t want to disturb the jute webbing, but I was curious about what was used to pad the front of the seat. To remove the decorative buttons, I cut the thread but tried to keep the original knot in the jute webbing, to mark where the new buttons should go. As I pulled out portions of the button thread (being careful to leave the main knot in place), some black horsehair pulled through the jute webbing. I think the main padding in the seat back is horsehair. Could it be?  

That’s where I stopped. I left the inside-back fabric in place.  Truth is, I was a little scared that things would start shifting too much if I removed it. The excelsior in the back was prone to splitting into clumps, and I didn’t want the main padding in the front to get lumpy. There is nothing wrong with how the padding in the backs of these chairs is performing, so I didn’t want to disturb it. The photos show some of the milling marks on the wood, and it shows how the top rail is a glue-up of several pieces. The curves are hand-planed. Later photos show more of this. 

Here is where I begin working with my new fabric. It is thicker than the original fabric. I used a vintage button-covering kit from my stash to do this. The #30 (3/4”) aluminum button blanks I used are a little bit bigger than the original #24 (1.4cm) mm steel buttons. 

I struggled with this step, so I don’t think I have any great tips here. Basically, you will need a button covering kit and you follow the specific directions that come with your kit. Your kit will have a special tool and some button blanks to cover. The button blanks consist of a cap, which you will cover with fabric, and a button back that presses into the mass of fabric and clamps it in place. The trick there is to trim out every bit of fabric that you don’t need, because it gets in the way of a tight clamp, while leaving every bit of fabric you do need so that the button back has something to grab onto.  

The tool consists of a mold that holds your fabric and the button blank, keeping them in place while you pound the button back with a setting tool and a hammer. One thing I can say is that I like the rubber mold in my kit, because it made the fabric curl around the edge of the button blank, guiding into the hollow of the back. The really hard thing is making sure your button back doesn’t jump out of place as you pound it in, and making sure you don’t pound too hard and flatten the front of your button. I guess I do have a tip: make sure you have plenty of extra button blanks, for mess-ups. 

To make sure the fabric didn’t come out of some of my iffier buttons, I put glue around the back of them. Not very all-natural. 

I loved seeing the tool that the pros use. At finnjuhl.com, click on “Production and Craftsmanship” and watch the video that runs at the top of the page. It gives a glimpse of the button-covering press they use to make fabric-covered buttons — THAT is the machine I covet the most, because covering buttons is a pain. 

Purists better not read this step... but I hope recyclers will enjoy it.

We were getting rid of our kids’ trampoline, and I had these grand ideas about using the trampoline mat as a replacement for the burlap. I laid awake at night thinking about what I would use as binding for the edges of the trampoline mat, and wondering if my sewing machine was up to the task of  sewing the binding on.

Then I found that my dear husband had cleaned out the garage, and thrown the trampoline parts away. On the one hand, this was a bad thing, because that tramp fabric has a lot of uses — it could be used to shade new vegetable transplants, or to keep hawks away from free range chickens. Or for chair suspensions in upholstery. On the other hand, my life is simpler since I don’t have all those projects waiting for me now. And we don’t even have chickens.

So I decided to cut down the tread belt from one of my husband’s old, dead running machines instead. My husband burned out a couple of running machines, and I saved some of the parts. I figured the tread belt was tough and would last a long time, though it doesn’t have much give. I laid it over the springs, similar to the way the burlap was used originally, but I curved it over the sides and stapled it down under the seat frame. When a person sits in the chair now, the springs still take some of the weight, but that heavy canvas-and-rubber tread takes most of the weight. Hopefully I won’t have to repair any more springs in the future. 

From my new fabric, I cut two strips about 18” (46cm) long and 8” (20cm) wide. Since my fabric has a lengthwise direction or grain, I had to be mindful of this while cutting out all 3 pieces that cover the seat frame, matching the look of the original. I used a tack strip to attach the fabric to the wood frame on the inside seam. In this first photo, you see the tack strip upside-down, but positioned where it is going to be tacked down. Then I laid the original batting over the tack strip to keep the fabric from rubbing against the tacks, and I flipped the fabric strips over towards the outside edge of the frame. Then I tacked the outside edges underneath with staples. I was careful to stretch the fabric around the “hip” (where the seat meets the back) of the chair frame as tightly as possible. Then I used a utility knife to trim the fabric close to the staples on the underside.  

Next, the front piece of fabric is applied in a similar way. I cut out a 30” (76cm) long by 12” (30.5cm) wide piece of fabric for this. I couldn’t measure the old piece of fabric because it was too far gone. When in doubt, you can cut a piece of fabric too large, and then trim away the excess. After securing the straight, inside edge with tack strip, I was ready to add my own innovation. In order to keep the fabric from tearing at the front of the seat frame like it had in the original, I wanted to add two layers of cotton batting over that area. I started by laying a folded piece of new cotton batting along that straight edge. I held that in place with two or three staples INSIDE the folded batting. The idea is to protect the outer fabric from rubbing against any hard edges. Then I flipped the fabric over, and hand-sewed the front piece to the side pieces at the seam.  

Now, I had to wrap the batting and fabric over the front of the frame, and somehow tack it all down while keeping a really tight, sleek look. I made sure both layers of batting covered the sharp edge of the frame, but below that, I wanted to reduce bulk. To make everything look smooth, I trimmed the under layer of batting about a half inch shorter than the top layer, and I trimmed the top layer to end just past where it disappears under the frame. I put a couple staples in the batting to keep it from shifting around. This left me with only the upholstery fabric as the longest and final layer, to secure with tacks and staples. To get the front corners as sleek and tight as possible, I had work and rework the fabric several times, especially since this new fabric is thicker than the original. First I secured the outside corner with one tack. Then I played around with how I would fold over the edges while ideally only having two layers of fabric. After checking and re-checking, I trimmed away any fabric I didn’t need, leaving one flap that formed the final cover.  

While the chair was upside-down, the sun came in the window and highlighted the wood frame. I was so impressed, I took several photos before I covered it up again. In the photos, you can see mill marks, hand-planing, and evidence of how wood was glued up to make some of the rails. Notice the photo with my hand it it — that is a photo of the front rail of the seat frame. Notice what looks like a hole in the wood near the bottom of the photo. In that hole, which is in the side rail of the seat, you can see the tenon of the front rail. It seems the frame was glued up, then shaped down, and the shaping cut very close to the mortise-and-tenon joint. My overall impression of the wood frame is that it looks like a crazy person cobbled it together, but it is solid as a rock. In the course of my upholstery work, I pounded tacks and staples into that frame at all angles. The frame flexed a little bit, then went right back into shape. Wonderful.  

Using the old seat outside-back as a pattern for cutting out both pieces I would need to cover the chair back, I cut out gently arched pieces of fabric about 29” long and 26.5” wide. I made sure to lay out the pieces so the directional grain of the fabric would run vertically on the finished chair. I knew the inside-back would need to be a little bit shorter, so I trimmed that piece about an inch shorter, knowing I could trim off any excess later.  

I used a line of staples and a nail set to attach the bottom edge of the inside-back to the frame. This was hard because I had left the original fabric on this part of the chair, and there were a lot of layers to go through. I used the longest tacks I had, and I think even a few short box nails. I don’t think this was ideal, but this seam doesn't get a lot of stress since the chair cushion touches it. If this seam fails, I have access to it for repairs. Then I stretched the fabric up to the top of the frame, and stapled it, stretching it taut as I went. Here I used the classic upholstery technique of putting one staple in the center of each side, making sure the overall position was correct and straight, before putting in all the staples. I hammered the staples in absolutely flat, and trimmed off the extra fabric.  

After that, it was time to sew the new buttons into place, using the old knots as a guide, and using the tape measure to make sure the spacing was correct. I eyeballed the level since my fabric has a definite grain, but using a level would have been better.  

To cover the outside-back, I temporarily tacked the fabric down in about 3 places to make sure it would go on generally straight. Then I started hand-sewing at the top, sewing down one side of the chair first, and then down the other. Here, it was handy that I had left the old fabric on the inside-back, because I could feel the ridge of the old fabric and lay my seam right next to that. Once I got to the bottom of the sides, to the “hips” of the chair, I did some more stretching and jiggering, and looking at the other chair for comparison, while I tacked the fabric down below the hip. I had to make sure that the fabric continued on until it disappeared under the curve of the frame… like the sun just dipping below the horizon. The original workmanship was such an inspiration here, it kept me stretching and pulling until I got something close to the original. A little pouffier, but close. If I had used real wool fabric, I could have steamed the wool at this point, causing it to shrink and tighten. I always imagined that is how they did it originally — and lo and behold, on the video at the top of the “Production and Craftsmanship” page at finnjuhl.com, that is the very last step they show you!   

Here are some photos comparing the original hand-sewn seam along the back to my new one, and the original hip covering to the new one.  

Before I reattached the chair to its frame, I renewed the wood frame by using 0000 steel wool to rub any scuffs and marks off of the legs, then I wiped on two coats of low gloss tung oil, though Danish oil would have been better. I also rubbed a little dark stain on one of the chair arms that had faded, and used almond oil and tung oil to get the tops of the arms to shine.  

Here's a photo of one original chair; one reupholstered but with the green seat, and then one after I recovered the seat cushion. I think a single color gives a sleeker look. I made the cushion covers slightly loose, because I plan to cut down a dense foam exercise mat and insert it as another layer of cushioning, under the existing padding, but inside the same cushion cover. I’ll have to play around with tapering the edge of the new padding to blend in the shape. If it doesn’t work, I’ll just stick with the existing padding and tighten up the cushion covers.  

Overall, I wish I could have done everything with all natural materials, but the chairs are comfortable and serviceable, and we’ll enjoy them for many decades to come. And I like that some of the original fabric is still under there, for future reference. I enjoyed spending hours in close contact with the amazing craftsmanship of the original makers, and I thought the quality of their work was worth documenting. I hope you enjoyed looking at it.