A 10Ft Church Pew Re-Do

I am always up for challenges and the designing side of my brain NEVER STOPS!

So when I was visiting my friend Libby's we were sitting outside on her porch enjoying having GIRL TALK sipping on our ice teas and watching my Girls and her Boys play in the back yard. When conversation came up about she was trying to come up with a shoe rack to go just inside the back door, She had one there already, A tall metal rack frame that had cream canvas bins that slide into it... It was kinda leaning sideways LOL!

So when she told me this the designer side of my brain started going crazy throwing all kinds of ideas out, BUT then I looked over at this OLD Weathered 10 foot church pew that had been sitting out on her porch and was starting to get water logged, a LIGHT BULB!! went off in my head

Hey Libby I said! How about that pew

She looked at me and said Tania that's way too big to go inside my house that is why it is sitting out here.

But Libby what if I cut it in half and make 2 new sides and I make 2 benches out of one and then I'll add a shelf to the bottom and you can put those canvas bins on the shelf to store all the shoes...

LIBBY: Brilliant idea Tania now get to it LOL!

SO HERE IS WHAT I DID

Her other bench looks just like this one...Duh! But per request Libby wanted no shelf on the bottom of the other one she just wanted it without so she could decorate underneath...

Her Sister-In-Law loved this so much that she also had the same pew that they had purchased from the same person and wanted me to make one for her Mom in BLACK and wanted one in White for her daughters room.....

SO THIS IS HOW I DID IT!

First I took the whole pew apart.... Now what a challenge that was cause It had a ton of nails and lots of screws that were hidden by wood filler that I didn't notice until I had busted up about 4 of my knuckles trying to pry it apart...

 Then I cut the boards in half and because of the notches on each end of the boards I had to retrace them on the fresh cut end since I was making 2

These are the sides which I traced around onto a piece of birch and cut them out with my trusty JIGSAW cause I also needed 2 more side to make the other bench....

Once I got all the pieces cut I sanded and then sanded some more and then some more ...Well you get the idea... Oh don't forget to wear your masks when doing this so that you are not breathing in all those dust particles..:)

So once I finished sanding I attached the back to the sides..

But I ran into a problem cause I did realize that by cutting the board in half that the center of the pew was warped from all the use over the years... So as you see in this next picture I had to go through the process of  clamping ,wetting the wood, and heating...repeat ...repeat ...repeat...

 ALMOST THERE!

AND JUST A LITTLE MORE!

Once I got the curve straightened in the wood I started to put the rest of it together

 SO HERE IT IS 2 BENCHES MADE FROM ONE 10 FOOT PEW

I then added a shelf to the bottom of each and primed them

One with white primer and one with grey primer since I was painting one WHITE and the other BLACK

HERE THEY ARE PAINTED........

And this Is what Crystal has done with the white one...

How CUTE with all the bright colors and I bet her daughter loves it...;)

HOPE you  enjoyed my tutorial, feel free to comment...

Thanks for visiting

CHEERS!