How to Make a Covered Vanity Stool

Fabric coordinated to your bedroom or bathroom décor will add a finishing touch to a vanity stool. The wood stool construction, which requires minimal finishing, can be covered with lavishly elegant fabric like silk or velvet or a more casual covering of denim or corduroy. Any type of fabric is applied to the stool by the same technique. Lumberyards will cut your plywood to the size needed if requested, eliminating time-consuming measuring and sawing.

Four pieces of 1/2-inch thick plywood measuring 18 by 12 inches
12-inch diameter 1/2-inch plywood circle
Wood glue
2-inch nails
Hammer
2-inch diameter round foam pillow form
2 yards fabric
Scissors
Staple gun
Straight pins
Sewing machine
Hot glue gun
1-yard decorative trim

Instructions

- 1
  Attach two rectangles of plywood together along the long edges at a right angle with the wood glue and let the glue dry for three hours. Hammer in nails every 3 inches to secure the joint. Repeat with remaining rectangles of wood to create an open-top, box form.
- 2
  Glue the circle to the centered top of the box form. Hammer in nails to secure the circle to the form every 3 inches.
- 3
  Place the pillow form over the fabric and cut out a circle of fabric 4 inches past the edge of the pillow form with scissors.
- 4
  Place the pillow form on the stool circle and cover the pillow form with the fabric circle. Attach the fabric circle to the plywood edges of the circle with the staple gun, inserting a staple every inch around the edge.
- 5
  Measure around the edge of the circle with the tape measure and add 1 inch. Measure the height of the circle edge from the floor and add 1 inch. Cut a rectangle of fabric to the measurements for the stool skirt.
- 6
  Fold one long edge of the rectangle under 1/2 inch to the wrong side twice and pin it in place with the straight pins for a hem. Stitch the hem in place with the sewing machine, using the straight stitch setting. Repeat to create a hem on one short edge.
- 7
  Attach the unhemmed, long edge of the stool skirt to the edge of the top circle, using the hot glue gun and carefully gluing the fabric in place 1 inch at a time, beginning at the unhemmed, short edge.
- 8
  Cut the binding to fit around the edge of the circle and attach it in place with the hot glue gun.

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