How to make old look like new old (distressed)

My dad offered me a chair that has been in his family since he was a little kid which was not my style at all, but I was looking for a new project, and we really did need more seating in the living room. I found this to be a perfect opportunity to try to make this unique chair more modern with my farmhouse style.

When I think of modern farmhouse, I think of distressed furniture either a whitewash or darkwash finish. This was my goal for this old manual recliner. Here are the steps.

1. Grab that table or peice of furniture you want to bring back to life.

2. Grab a sander - You will need an electric sander unless you have 5 years to spare, and a strength of hulk. Electric sanders are really not expensive. Here is the one I got. (Its on sale for 26 dollars) worked like a charm.

3. Clean, Clean Clean,

4. Sand Sand Sand. You should sand enough so that the natural wood is showing. This chair was made so well, I used 15 pieces of sand paper to sand this chair! - Oh that's right, duh, you need sand paper. You need to get the lowest number of sand paper grit you can find. the lower the number, the rougher that sand paper. Here is the sand paper I used.

5. Dust. once you are done sanding, you need to clean the item again, you want to make sure the chair is clean so when you stain the item, its clean and smooth.

6. Find your stain. I was looking for a greyish brown stain. This is the one I used, and note, unless your staining an entire barn, you can get the the smallest can possible.

7. STAIN - Stain is different from paint. Stain soaks into wood and dries where as paint is a layer on top. To stain the item, you can use a foam brush or even a old clean shirt. and wipe the stain along the grain of the furniture. ALITTLE GOES A VERY LONG LONG WAY. Don't panic if you think it's to dark or you put to much on - we are not done yet.

8. The Stain should dry fairly quickly - I would say 2 hours to be safe. One the stain in dry, we need to sand again. Using high grit sheet of sand paper, softly run the paper over the entire item. This will lighten the stain. Now go back and focus on the edges, and corners and with more pressure, sand the area down for the natural wood to show back through. This will give the look of "distressed" . After you do the corners and edges, take a step back and look at the piece, you are now welcome to go in and sand other area as you wish.