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Old sofa - fabric dye advice needed

(6 Posts)
Skydancer Thu 23-Mar-23 14:30:21

We have an old Tesco sofa which has kept its shape but is faded. The fabric appears to be synthetic and therefore I wonder if I could try fabric dye. The fabric is flat and would seem to have some kind of coating on it. Has anyone ever done this? I'd love to keep it rather than buy a new one. I suppose I could try dyeing a bit of the back to see how it works.

Calipso Thu 23-Mar-23 14:36:33

I think you'd need to consider fire safety with whatever you may be considering putting on it. Why not try a stretchy cover for it?

Germanshepherdsmum Thu 23-Mar-23 14:58:18

I’d be concerned about dye transferring onto clothes when I sat on it. Why not get a loose cover for it?

Skydancer Fri 24-Mar-23 14:05:05

Do stretchy covers really fit? Is there one size fits all? I've never thought about that. I just can't bear to part with this sofa.

Germanshepherdsmum Fri 24-Mar-23 14:18:33

I would say it’s worth getting proper loose covers rather than stretchy ones.

PinkCosmos Fri 24-Mar-23 16:37:14

I had a sofa that was faded. The material was mainly linen and was a plain fabric.

I used a product called Fabricoat. The sofa was originally medium blue and I dyed it dark grey.

I took the sofa outside and sprayed the dye on - you can buy all of the equipment online. You would have to do a test patch first

It cost me about £100 altogether (about four years ago) and, although it did dye the fabric it looked a bit shiny. It went on evenly and it didn't transfer onto clothing

I did dye the four cushions covers separately as they zipped off. I used Dylon in the washing machine. I dyed them two at a time and one set came out lighter than the other one, even though I used exactly the same dye.

I have since considered just having new cushion covers made and some arm covers.

I enquired about re-upholstering the sofa but they wanted almost as much as it would have cost for a brand new sofa!!

I think I have seen that you can paint furniture with Annie Sloan chalk paint but I think that gives it a leathery kind of effect.

Here is the link for the Fabricoat:

www.furnitureclinic.co.uk/fabric-products/fabric-paints-dyes/fabricoat-fabric-paint?gclid=Cj0KCQjwlPWgBhDHARIsAH2xdNfBL_Qa15fPXD8EW8uXIeFsi_eFv3Ce61eA9B4IvaY75InQHG29ns8aAjCBEALw_wcB