Wooden High Chair Refinishing: My Newest Obsession

domesticallyupcycled
Jul 3, 2015
2 min read

High chairs, high chairs, high chairs! Find me high chairs! --- My newest obsession is finding (hunting down) old wooden high chairs & bringing new life to them! I absolutely love to refinish these classic beauties. Of course, it's very hard to find them, but that's all part of the fun!

Sanding to remove the old glossy top coat is required, and I definitely recommend 3M Ultra Flexible Sandpaper. Makes sanding between all those spindles so much easier! Generally, I spray paint them, and also spray on a glossy clear coat. I love using Rustoleum brand spray paint. Please note, that if your old wooden high chair has old paint on it, please don't sand it, as it may be lead-based. Priming and spraying over this should suffice.

Many people are concerned about these refinished chairs being "food safe." I have not been able to locate a food safe top coat as of yet, and from my research on it, I am not positive one even exists. The only "food safe" product I have really seen is butcher block stain. Of course, I'm not an expert, but I believe that refinished high chairs are completely fine to use on a daily basis, as long as your clear coat is glossy (makes for easier wipeable cleanup). If anyone does know of a food safe top coat, please let me know.

I have also found that it is easy to make vinyl fitted placemats for these high chairs. You can use fabric or paper to make these, anything of your choosing (with a cute pattern)...(Tutorial to come!)

Products used:

Fine grit 3M Flexible Sandpaper

Bondo (for deep scratches on the tray)

Rustoleum Flat White Primer

Rustoleum Turquoise Enamel Spray Paint

Rustoleum Glossy Clear Coat Spray

The process:

After sanding (removing old glossy coating) and priming, I used Rustoleum Turquoise Enamel spray paint. Although the enamel paint dried beautifully and has an almost glass-like finish to it, I probably won't be using it too often, as the only problem I had is enamel paint takes a VERY long time to dry. It feels tacky to the touch for hours afterwards. For me, though, it did seem to help to spray the glossy clear coat over it about 10 minutes after spraying the enamel paint on (of course, that enamel coat has to be the last coat you need on it). The clear coat covered it, & seemed to have a quicker drying time on top of the fresh enamel paint. I would still suggest waiting a few days to use the chair (up to a week) to make sure the paint is fully cured.

We ended up having to use Bondo (shown below) on the top of the tray because of scratches that were very visible once the primer was on. Bondo is great to use to flat surfaces and dries completely smooth and flat after you sand it. We tried to use wood filler before the Bondo, but it just wasn't getting rid of those deep scratches as smoothly as we had liked.