When our second lounge was vacated, it was kept empty for about a year and then Meg and I decided that we would re-purpose it and designate its function as a 'Music lounge'. Initially, we located an audio system within it, inherited from my son and his wife, but we gradually populated it with music playing and music creating instruments as follows:
I managed to get this chair in an eBay auction with my bid being got in just in 4 seconds before the closing time. Naturally, it required quite a lot of careful care and attention to get it in its present condition. The very nice man who sold it to me in the Moseley district of Birmingham said he had acquired it decades before in an antique shop near the Welsh borders. He himself said that if it had a trace of a maker's trademark, then the price commanded would have been several times than the successful bid price. We have this piece occupying a pride of place in our quite large square hall where it is a very useful chair for Meg to sit down and put on outside clothing. It constitutes a sort of 'father' chair because we now have a second examplar as a sort of 'mother' chair. This second chair (Captain_2a chair) I bought from a 'Men in Sheds' project in Worcester - it has a very slight flaw in the banding which the original owmer (and I) agree sort of adds to its charm and is not worth repairing (as a bodged repair might make it look worse so we have left it as it is)
Having acquired our organ for next to nothing, we now felt the need for a piano stool which is not an item you see regularly in the charity furniture stores. So when I saw one in our local AgeUK charity furniture store, I fell upon it and immediately wanted to buy it. They were a little flummoxed by all of this as it has only been hand delivered into the shop a few minutes beforehand and they had not had a chance to price it. The only thing that the donor had said was that it had been re-upholstered in a very expensive fabric, at which I thought to myself that you would not go to this expense unless it was already a good piece of furniture. So we agreed a price and I got it home, after which I gave it the restoration technique I have learned from antique furniture restorers on the web. Basically this consists of a simple clean with very dilute washing up liquid, then the application of the best beeswax polish that can be afforded with a 'Grade '0000' steel wool which does not absorb the polish,then left alone for about 20-25 minutes and finally buffed up with a lint free cloth. This has restored a beautiful patina, not really a deep gloss, to the article which I think is probably vintage (c. 1890-1910) and judged by what I have read on the web, probably worth 7-8 times what I actually paid for it.
Having acquired one piano stool, I felt the need for a second so that Meg and I could sit side-by-side whilst one played the 'left hand' accompaniment and the other played the principal 'right hand' melody. Well, that was the original intention but it did not quite work out that way. This piece was advertised in the Bromsgrove area and I was the only bidder for it. It turned that the owner was the next door neighbour of our domestic help. Like the previous example, this is almost certainly vintage and once given the restoration treatment of its companion, looks a fine piece of furniture. I now use it, with a complement of cushions, as it just about the right height for my IBM laptop upon which I write emails and blog whilst Meg is watching the TV.
This was fine piece found in my local AgeUK shop and although it had not been in the store for very long, I offered below the asking price and this was accepted. The shape of the leg is that suggested by a sabre sword and this particular piece is decorated with a little of what I suspect is gold leaf inlay and is beautifully made. I believe that the wood is a light mahogany but it could be a cherry wood from what I read on the web. Again, this is probably a vintage piece and worth many times than the price for which it was acquired. We reserve its use for 'important' visitors to the house
I have put into place a lttle computer work station with an IBM Thinkpad on it which, whilst being very slow, has the most excellent keyboard and is excellent for the writing of emails and blogs whilst Meg is watching the TV. I needed a chair to be brought into use when required and I found this piece in our local 'New Start' centre (which both receives and sells second hand furniture)thinking that this would serve. When I spotted it, it was in a terrible condition with workmens' boots footprints all over the seat. But once I got it home, I have discovered it is of Italian construction and made of 100% genuine leather i.e. not 'Faux' or PU(= polyurethane) leather substitute. This furniture is often found in quite traditional restaurants and is of a very sound construction which, when you think about it, it would need to be if it had to accommodate persons of different sizes and shapes for several hours a day when used in a restaurant. After a thorough cleaning and leather restoration, I now use it as just an occasional chair in our Music Lounge and not, as I originally intended, for my workstation. When new, it would probably sell for at least seven times the price I paid for it.
This piece was occupying a prominent position in our local AgeUK furniture shop and, although it had only been on display fo a day or so, they had already marked it down from a low initial starting price. Meg was with me when we saw it and we both concurred it was a bargain not to be passed by. The maker (revealed in a tiny tag on the base of the chair) is an Italian manufacturer of highest quality furniture. The leather is 100% genuine and is not in a distressed condition. Naturally, I have applied some really good leather polish to it and it is actually superbly comfortable and supportive with wood (not plastic) embellishment. According to an American website I have consulted, a brand new exemplar would cost about 28 times what I paid for it
This last piece is not quite in the same category as the pieces detailed above. It was bought for purely functional reasons and is shown complete with some embellishments which I have added (such as a throw on the seat and some decorative fabrics which sit on the top of the support cushions) to remove the overwhelming sense of 'beige' which might otherwise predominate. It was bought solely so that my wife and I could side by side in an enjoyable and relaxed fashion when the occasion demands such as when my wife meeds a bit of an uplift in spirit, and it served its purpose whilst Meg could stand and walk around. The piece was found in our local AgeUK furniture store and cost more than the average for the other pieces but rather stood out as in pristine condition (although I did give it a kind of ritualised refreshment clean) and looked markedly superior to the other rather tired looking pieces that it was sitting alongside.
I was looking for a chair to use when utilising my laptop in our Lounge. This is quite a pleasant piece but I now know that I could really do with a chair with arms in this particular location. It has not turned to be particularly comfortable chair and so I now use it as an occasional chair in the bedroom section of our 'L' shaped lounge. Although deployed at one time as a 'bedside' chair, I have recently replaced it with a much more comfortable one with a much deeper seat and padded back. I suspect the chair, whilst looking attractive, could well do with some additional upholstery foam in the seat and it does not quite fulfil the original intention for which I had bought it.
I spotted this in our local AgeUK furniture store and it was a bargain not to be missed. Plumped up with cushions, it is a very comfortable chair for when I am using the laptop on my desk in the lounge. I think it must be faux leather rather than actual leather at the price I paid for it but you would never know.
Now that we have part of our 'L' shaped lounge converted into a bedroom for Meg, there is quite a need for chairs on which to place spare clothing, bed linen and other supplies. I saw this chair radically marked down to less than £5.00 from its original price and immediately thought of a use for it so I bought it on the spot. I think that it may have re-covered in the past but it blends in with the rest of our decor, has a pretty broad seat and back and is superbly comfortable so I impulse bought it with no regrets to complement the rest of our acquisitions.
I actually saw this and ordered it before I espied the tub chair but it took a long time to arrive. The quality does not match the elm wood of my other captain's chairs (I suspect that it is a varnished pine) and looked pretty tatty when I first acquired it. However, after some restoration work and a bit of wood glue, it now sits alongside the very first captain's chair we bought in about 1967 and actually looks reasonably presentable after all.The two chairs have identical cushions so they form a 'pair' and sit under the front window in our Music Lounge.
I could not resist taking an additional photo of this to show how it actually looks 'in situ' The base of the chair has a green damask cushion on it which is a match with its companion chair bought years ago whilst the back displays a cushion with a wonderful 'birds of paradise' design which adds a touch of elegance. In addition the dark staining of the wood matches well the dark window surround so the window and chair below it display a type of match which is quite fortuitous but which shows off the chair to its full advantage.
We saw this in the AgeUK shop at a good price and it was superbly comfortable. We have it forming an 'open square', complementing the leather chairs that both Meg and Mike sit in. It creates a beautifully intimate little space in this half of the room and it means that Meg and I, plus two visitors, can easily chat whilst facing each other. It works perfectly in the way intended and creates a pleasant, homely and intimate space and we are thrilled to have taken the plunge and bought it.
This sofa is meant to be a working sofa but although a pleasant shade of brown, we did not want slabs of brown leather to dominate the room. So I have 'dressed' it with an Indian cotton throw, some interesting 'bird design' decorations along the top (actually a set of table linen which we have used on our fabric sofa as well) and a Chindi (Indian) coloured mat in front of it (being sold off in our local Aldi and purchased before it disappeared) The care workers actually love it, making a beeline for it and and actually occupying it the minute they come into the room.
I saw this little beauty in our local AgeUK shop and it had only just been put in the window. Meg and I actually came out of the store and thought that this was too good an opporunity to pass by and so went in and bought it on the spot. Being a 'boudoir' chair in a fabulous damask, it complements the more utilitarian chairs we have in the downstairs bedroom portion of our lounge and adds a little touch of class to what might otherwise be a more hospital-like environmnt
Evidently, I have acquired these pieces of furniture just as and when I have managed to see them and then applied some restoration to each. The question that is inevitably raised is whether all of these constitute a complete hotch-potch of incompatible pieces. If placed randomly next to each other, then this charge would have some force. But some discernment has been utilised as to what goes where and, in general, the mahogany and oak pieces occupy one side of the room and the lighter pieces the other. In addition, the judicious use of cushions and seat pads has helped to enhance the natural qualities of each piece. So I would say that if there was a spectrum of hotch-potch on one side and carefully blended pieces on the other, then the entire collection would tend more towards the right hand side rather than the left hand side of the spectrum.
Naturally, having acquired and then restored these items, we have no intention of selling them and they give us a certain amount of pleasure when we are trying to create a tranquil aura in our Music Lounge as well as in our Main Lounge which now has to double up as a bedroom for Meg. A rough totting up of what we have spent in total is of the order of £425 over the fourten pieces. And, by the way, our room is now officially 'full'.
© Mike Hart [2024]
