Seats on dining room chairs

catkins

About 2 months ago I bought 6 stripped oak dining chairs on ebay. They are lovely chairs and I am very happy with them. Unfortunately they have cream seats. Or I should say they did have cream seats because after 2 months of my two cats laying on them they are now cream with muddy pawprints and black and grey hairs. Of course cats being cats they lay on all of them not just one!!!

Anyway yesterday bought some lovely fabric to recover them and although the fabric is mainly black with some silver in (probably sounds horrible but it actually very nice) I don't really want them to get filthy again and covered in fur. I had thought of buying some of those cheap tie on seat covers although they probably won't look very good but can't seem to see them anywhere.

Has anyone any suggestions? I want something on them that won't look too awful and which I can take off easily when we use the chairs or have visitors.
I have tried just putting a towel or some material on the chairs but the cats pull it off!!!

squeaky

Could you stitch some tape onto old tea towells (or even just tie it to corners) so you have some covers that only need to come off when you have visitors?

ChocClare

How about doing a sort of loose cover?

In other words, instead of stapling or tacking the fabric to the underneath of the chair as you would if you were reupholstering, do the following:

Draw the outline of the seat by tracing round it onto a sheet of newspaper to give you a pattern.

Allow a generous margin around the edge.

Either fold under a largish hem all the way round and machine it at least half an inch from the edge OR edge with wide bias binding folded in half.

In either case, thread some tape through the hem or bias binding all the way round and pull up so that it gathers tight onto the chair. Tie off the tape underneath the chair.

Obviously you will probably have to cut out and edge the bits where the seat of the chair joins the back and you may need extra ties for this.

I do hope you can visualise what I'm talking about!!!

ivyleaf

These are both very good ideas - if it was me i'd probably do what Squeaky suggested, as it sounds a bit easier. You could use cheap cushion covers rather than tea towels, if you wanted. I put old towels on my chairs - my cats don't seem to have worked out how to pull them off (yet!)

MATH

I recover my dining room chairs every couple of months due to owning three filthy cats and three filthy children and then there's Mrs MATH;) I get an offcut of on sale fabric from Dunhelm, cut into squares allowing a good margin and duck tape them on on the underside on the seat pad. I used to hem and upholstery tack them but duck tape is easier and you don't need to hem unless you plan to wash them. Get cheapo sale fabric use and chuck away is my advice. HTH

Gingham_Ribbon

I'm having the same problem with my sofas. Just wanted to lend some moral support!

Trow

Orange peel works to keep the cats off, but might look a bit odd when visitors come round!

Kimberley

Cheap baking foil. Everytime you go out put foil on the seats. Dogs and cats hate the sound.:)

Spendless

We've had to have our cream dining chair seats re-covered too. MIL made new covers but with them elasticated round the edges (like a shower cap IYSWIM). This means they can be pulled off and stuck in WM.

catkins

Thank you for all the replies. Not sure which suggestion to go for. I think I might try the tin foil one to see if it puts them off getting on the chairs for good. The orange peel is also interesting. I may well end up putting covers over the actual covered seat (if you see what I mean) but I just feel it would be a shame as the new fabric I have bought is lovely and it wouldn't be on show the majority of the time.

I love my cats to bits but they really are a pain at times!!!

Debt_Free_Chick

To be quite honest, recovering seats like this is actually quite easy and cheap to do. Certainly easy if you have a big tack gun, to staple the fabric to the underside of the seat.

I would be inclined simply to recover them every now & then. It also has the advantage of creating a new look for your dining room, which you could match with new napkins etc.

Of course you have to have the energy to do this. But then, you'll need the energy to run around placing and removing orange peel or tin foil You could go through quite a bit of tin foil in the average year, unless you were religious about "saving" it for reuse.

Sorry - probably not very helpful, as it gives you yet another option to consider - mmmmm decisions, decisions