trial and error on an antique piece...

    When I first met my husband, I remember being at his moms house and seeing this interesting piece of furniture in her basement. It was in the back of the furnace room, hiding away in  a corner, but it caught my attention quickly...how fortunate for me that she decided to share it with me! I couldn't be happier! Turns out it was an old radio cabinet converted into a side table. I love things with back stories! For about 3 years I used this piece as is in my living room, moving it from place to place always trying to figure out where it looked best. One day I decided I had enough of the old, yellowing white paint, and set out with my Circa 1850 stripper and paint scrapper.

    Fast forward almost 4 years later...this piece was sitting in my basement, fully stripped showing herself to the world. My intent originally was to strip, sand and stain. I love the look of wood and always try and capture it on older pieces when I'm able to. I was let down with some very old water damage to the wood veneer on the one side, which prevented my dreams of a dark stain from coming to life. So, back to the drawing board I went to come up with a clever idea...and finally I had it! I've been reading a lot of blogs these days and gathered a bunch of ideas and set out in my kitchen to bring this piece back to life!

Here it is...the eye sore. It was a shame, but in the end it all worked out for the best!

View from the back. It didn't have a backing to it, and the inside wood was all rotting. This piece is old! 

I tore off a piece of painted plywood to expose the front, now creating a functional storage piece.

This was the table top after I stripped the old paint off. It was most likely lead paint and I feel like an idiot for stripping it off. Please note, lead paint is very dangerous for your health.

   Off I set to put all my recent reading knowledge to use. I'm one of those people that only figure things out by doing them, but I feel I get a pretty good grasp at it just by reading about it...yup...one of "those" people, hehe. I mixed up some white chalk paint and off I went. The great thing about chalk paint is that once you distress a piece it really gives great details!

     I learned the hard way that if you strip down to bare wood, you should either prime or seal the wood first before painting. I put the white on and it was amazing. When it came time to seal it, I used Polycrylic because apparently it won't yellow like polyurethane, and it is low odour so I was able to use it in my kitchen without getting the entire house stoned off of bad fumes! But..it yellowed, well, more like oranged and browned. I was heart broken...I sealed it with 2 coats, then added some more white chalk paint (this stuff goes over everything!) and sealed it again. It took some of the colour away but not all of it. At this point I just decided to incorporate it into my design...the aged look is in right now anyways.

    Staying true to my love of natural wood, I used a dark walnut Mini-Wax stain for the top,2 coats and sealed it with 3 coats of polycrylic. I love how it's turned out! I painted the inside, added a new piece of wood to the bottom and back and called it a day. This piece went from a partial eye sore to a conversation piece! 

I think the contrast between the bright white and the dark stained wood top.

With a little distressing along the wood details, this piece speaks for itself!

Here she is from start to end:

**Always ensure you have a super cute Supervisor when completing all tasks in life <3

Adding A Pop of Colour to My Office...

     I love colour. To say anything other than love would be an understatement, however, colour can be a little over bearing for some people...I'm not one of those people! I do believe though that there is a time and a place for bright colours. 

    In my office I painted one of the main walls the most amazing pinkish-coral colour, and the other three walls bright white to offset the boldness of the coral wall. Then the rest of the colour I'm bringing in through furniture, artwork and accessories. I still have a lot to do, like sew up some curtains, replace the light fixture and some other odds and ends,but here was the starting point.

    Every night I sit at my desk and think about the need for a good client chair. I don't know why, but for some reason I felt I needed one, and it had to be perfect. I'm pretty frugal, that's the fancy way of saying cheap, so I hit up Kijiji in search of my "perfect chair". It doesn't exist. At least not in a frugal world. So instead I found this little guy for $5.00, great price, not quite so great looking....yet.

  I must admit, I graduated college from a Interior Design program and have always been artsy,so while seeing something ugly will always be something ugly to some, I see beyond...I see into its furniture soul I guess you could say! This chair had been previously owned by a younger college student, so it served it's purpose as a chair and as he was moving out decided to get rid of it at such a low price! His loss was fully my gain! Just look at the structure of this lil guy, great curves, who doesn't like curves! 

   So I set off to the fabric store, which lucky me is a 5 minute walk from my doorstep...I practically live there these days! Being the off season for bright and fun fabric I knew I had a good chance at scoring some great fabric at a 'frugal' price, haha...again, I'm super cheap but I know how to rock it! I searched through every bolt of fabric they had on clearance and finally found "the one", the perfect addition to my room...it pulls out the colour in my roadside vanity that I made over, and the colour from my wall. I was in love, and what was even better than it being the perfect match? The price! $44.00 a meter regular price on sale for $22.00 a meter, and since I needed less than a meter in total it cost $13.00 for my fabric. I have enough still to do another chair so I'm happy about that! By now you're probably getting eager to see this perfect fabric on this soon to be perfect chair....I'm getting there, just stay with me another minute....

   Have you ever tried chalk paint? If not, I recommend it. It's fantastic! I'm lazy...I have 2 boys, which means no time for sanding and priming in this house! But using chalk paint takes care of all that! I mixed my own, being true to my cheapness, from the latex paint I used on my wall. It took about 5 coats, but chalk paint dries in a fraction of the time regular latex paint does, so it only took 2 days in total. I set up shop in my kitchen and put up a blockade of baby gates to keep all the little hands and paws out of my way,I still managed to get paint all over the place, that's ok though, some hot water and an old cloth and things are back to new!

   Five coats of home made chalk paint and the most amazing fabric and my perfect chair is complete! Here she is...yes, now it's a she.

   

    I'm in love! What do you think of her transformation?

   And here she is all ready for clients to enjoy her new beauty, set up in my office, next too the roadside vanity that matches so perfectly!

How could I live without colour?!