FEATURE
Upcycling update STORY AND PHOTOS BY CHRISTINE A. SMYCZYNSKI
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andemic sheltering saw a rise in popularity of “do it yourself” projects. My favorite kind is furniture upcycling; taking and refinishing an old piece of furniture to create something new for your home offers a sense of accomplishment and keeps furniture out of a landfill. Longtime readers may recall an paint, my dad’s old workbench became article back in 2015 that detailed a side table. While those projects were satisfying, upcycling furniture from my parents. I painted various shelving units hot the furniture that had most sentimental pink; they now hold my daughter’s art value to me was an Adirondack style supplies. My deck furniture includes loveseat and two matching chairs. antique wooden chairs that I refinished When my husband and I married and reupholstered. With some new forty-one years ago, we had our photos
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www.foreveryoungwny.com | November 2021
This Adirondack loveseat was upcycled to a planter in 2015...
taken in my parents’ picturesque backyard. Several feature the wedding party sitting on that furniture. After my mom’s passing in 2009, I helped my father clean and discovered the loveseat and chairs stored in the rafters of his garage. He was happy to give them to me. We used them for seating in our yard and, when they
became too rickety to sit on, I turned them into planter chairs that graced my garden for a few years. When moisture and other elements began breaking down the wood, I had to discard the two smaller seats. Even the loveseat was becoming too frail to support a potted plant. My husband was skeptical that it
