Ready for another amazing furniture makeover? It's one of our most popular dressers to date! The other day Chelsea contacted us asking if we had any antique highboy dressers available. Luckily we were able to quickly find this beauty listed on craigslist and we snatched it up as fast as we could. Everything about it just screamed "take me home, make me beautiful again!" It had such potential!
As custom orders go, Chelsea picked this amazing color and asked for the legs to be stained. I've said it before, and I will continue to say it! Clients always pick the best colors! This one is called Summer Dragonfly by Behr. It's a beautiful teal. In some light it shows more green and in other it shows more blue. I love that about it!
Before we could get painting though, we had a small few repairs to make as well as lightly sand and clean the whole piece thoroughly. The least fun part of the transformation, but also the most important. I really just wanted to get the paint and stain on this and see the amazing transformation, but the prep work is so important. Repairs should always be made before painting to prevent scratching and ruining the new finish.
Once all repairs were made we took 220 grit sandpaper and lightly sanded everything down then cleaned up the dust and gunk with TSP solution and a rag. This helped the paint adhere to the old finish. Yes, chalk paint is made to stick to "any" surface, but I don't like to leave that to chance. If the surface is too shiny or slick it can easily peel or flake off still. If a piece is super duper shiny and slick then I make sure to prime first as well. We want the finish to last years and years.
Since Chelsea wanted stained legs we then taped off the legs plus about 1/4" of the dresser bottom (right above the legs) to make sure paint wouldn't get on the legs. We used
painters tape and
brown paper to protect the legs.
Once the prep work was finally done we took it outside and painted away using our
Wagner Paint Sprayer. I absolutely love this thing! Simply thin out the paint using the little funnel tool provided with the paint sprayer, plug it in and get to painting. *We have a great blog coming up soon that will get into all the details on how to use the paint sprayer to get an even coverage and make painting quicker and easier.*
Once all the paint was dry we removed the tape and paper around the legs and grabbed our tiny paint brush to touch up the dresser right above the legs without getting any paint on the legs. After the few coats of paint were dry we lightly sanded everything down with 220 grit sandpaper just to lightly distress the edges. We then wiped everything down with a damp rag.
Using a foam brush and
walnut gel stain by Minwax, we brushed stain onto the legs. Usually with stain you wipe the excess back off after letting it sit for a few minutes. Gel stain doesn't get wiped back off. Because of this we made sure to do a very light even coat. Light even coats are the key here. If you want it darker you can always do more coats. But the streaks of an uneven finish make it hard to look like a real stained finish since gel stain sits on top of the finish and doesn't soak in like regular stain when applied to furniture like this.
We let the gel stain completely dry and gave everything a few thorough coats of
Polyurethane to seal in the paint and stain as well as offer extra durability. The original hardware was lightly cleaned, leaving the dark antique finish that only years of sitting around can achieve.
It couldn't have turned out any better! Especially when Chelsea came to pick it up and absolutely loved it! This one will be a statement piece that will last years to come. We're so honored to have been able to help Chelsea with this project! Thank you Chelsea!
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Labels: DIY, Dresser, Painted Furniture
