Nightstand Gets Renewed Life

Here is a story of another piece of furniture - destined for certain death, but given a second chance right here in TheSmithGarage. It was quite unhappy and a little chippy on top. Picked this up at a thrift store several weeks back, and I have been searching for what to do with it. I actually hoped to save it for another few weeks and give it a treatment of CeCe Caldwell's Paint, but I am so impatient, I needed to get in the garage this weekend and do something. So this little guy got his lucky day with some ASCP Provence Blue. Here is what he looked like before any work got started.

And I used a bit of sanding on top to remove some of the chippy paint/stain/lacquer that was on top. Looking back now, I should have removed it all, now I know. I had to apply a few extra coats of paint to build up the top enough to get a smooth finish.

You might be able to tell from the pictures this is 80s furniture. It has a rolling slider drawer, which is nice, but it was badly mistreated when it comes to the finish. So - as I mentioned before - I still have some of my ASCP $40 paint in TheSmithGarage, so why not use it if I need to repair and save an old piece. Provence it is.

This is a picture taken just after I applied some CeCe Caldwell's clear wax. Did I tell you before it smells like honey. I actually was tempted to slap a bit of it on some toast and give it a try. The wax is very nice and smells great, but it does take a night to cure, even with the sunlight.

So after a good nights sleep, and a little work with the buffer - I chose a simple old brass pull to add a bit of elegance to this piece. Of coarse I painted it with my VW muffler silver (AKA - nickel).

The finished piece -

Do you love it? I hope someone does - it already went to TheSmithHotel at Oregon Street Antique Mall. I know it's not an antique, but it is something that folks are looking for at antique malls. It's funny, our many of our thrift stores in town have started raising their prices so high, that people are looking in Antique stores for furniture now. It's kind of ridiculous that a place like Salvation Army ("doing the most good" is their slogan) could charge retail prices for used beat-up furniture, but they do. So if you are local and looking for clean, quality, redone furniture for reasonable prices - come to Oregon Street Antique Mall and you just might be surprised at what you find - make sure you come upstairs and visit our space at TheSmithHotel.

On another exciting note - my shipment of CeCe Caldwell's Paint will be here this week. Can't wait to have my first "paint party" for my friends here in town.

Linking to:
Between Naps on the Porch
I Should Be Mopping The Floor
DIY Home Sweet Home
Domestically Speaking
Primitive and Proper
{Primp}
Shades of Amber
The Shabby Creek Cottage
Beyond the Picket Fence - under $100
Decorating Insanity
Miss Mustard Seed
Until next time ...

Mr. Smith

Junk To Treasure - Beach Style

Well it has been a week on the road for me in Minnesota - you can check out more about that at Gate 87A . So I had some time to work on a few items over the past few days. One of them I picked up at Junk N Treasures - a great place to shop for us, but we try to find really rough stuff so Wanda will give us a deal. This shelf was rough - I tried to take a few pictures to show the before.

Almost 7' tall. At one time it had cabinet doors on a couple of bottom shelves.

Can you see the dirt and grime? Probably some guy's garage shelf. Lots of dirt and one spot with gooey stuff like molasses.

And this one spot that needed repair. We paid $25 for it (bundled with some other junk).

So, I got out the belt sander, the sanding block, a putty knife and a wire brush and started cleaning. I put some wood filler in the gaping crack, and clamped it back together, then started painting. I used a roller to cut the time of painting, not really knowing what type of final finish I wanted. I had some darker oops paint that I thought would give the dirt and grime a good covering on the shelves. Here it is after that paint.

Then a few coates of white. I think Mrs. Smith wanted it white, but some of the grease and grime was still coming through the white, and I would have had to paint several coates to get a really pure white look.

After reading a post regarding "color" from Bungalow 47 , I decided I wanted something new and colorful - and bright. Another can of oops paint - and working with a brush that I cut to make it easy access to the smaller spaces - I was determined to finish this journey with something cool and "beachy".

I brushed the paint on lightly, so the white would come through. Wow I like this look.

So thank you Bungalow 47 for your inspiration. Not sure if this will go in our home or the store, either way, I enjoyed cleaning up this piece of junk and turning it into someone's treasure.

Mr. Smith

Linked to:
Funky Junk Interiors
The Shabby Creek Cottage
At The Picket Fence
Beyond the Picket Fence