Recovering a Classic

	The Chair, Before

I may still be a fool, but my money and I are not soon parted. Throw in the complementary but not always copacetic taste of my wife, Lorraine, and it took us more than a year to agree upon a living room chair. (Don't even ask about the lack of a floor lamp -- that's an ongoing 18-month debate.)

We found the winner in the deepest basement recesses of Horseman Antiques, a four-floor, overstuffed shop anchoring the Antiques Row section of Brooklyn, N.Y.'s Atlantic Avenue.

Another chair sat upside-down atop it, like a kid doing a headstand. I removed it, and was delighted to find that what looked like a simple seat was instead a rocker.

Throw in cool orange fabric and Danish modern styling that we both dug, and, well, I called over a salesman to haggle.

It didn't last long. "The Scandinavian stuff is going like crazy," he said. "And they made such great oranges back then." Confirming our good judgment alone would have sealed the deal, but when he dropped the price from $325 to $285, my alligator arms stretched all the way to my wallet.

Even in the murky light we could tell that the chair needed a stern cleaning, and its foam padding had lost some firmness. (After 40 years, what hasn't?)

Still, the chair debuted to rave reviews among our friends. Ours was a happy collection of furniture.

Restoration Calls

In retrospect, I think the chair knew my anal retentiveness would get the best of me -- that after cleaning it to no improvement and endlessly shifting to try to mold my padding to its padding, I had designs on an overhaul.

Maybe I'm just paranoid. But one afternoon, rocking away while making some conversational point to my friend Glen, I had that sick, helpless moment when I knew I had literally reached the tipping point. Time stopped, and then my head conked the floor.

Nothing was injured but my pride, and Glen got a good laugh at my expense. The chair had won this battle, but I would win the war. I resolved at that moment to have it refurbished to perfection, no matter the cost. Yes, I was that mad.

I called Boerum Hill Restoration (718-243-1972), expecting to be told simply to bring in the chair and pick it up a few days later.

Not so fast: The owner, Norman Benjamin, redirected me to venerable Zarin Fabrics, established in 1936, in Manhattan's Lower East Side.

There, Lorraine and I would purchase the desired replacement fabric after measuring the chair to determine the needed yardage.