Monday 11 April 2016

Vicar's Craft Corner – Chest of Drawers Revamp

The new addition to the family on its way has given me the perfect opportunity (ahem...excuse...!) to do a bit of home decorating. We have never lived in a place that we own so I have gotten used to making my mark through the furniture we have, usually against the standard renters white and beige walls.

As I started to fully appreciate the mountain of stuff that comes with a tiny person I realised that I need to get hold of a chest of drawers for them or risk being swallowed whole under a pile of baby grows, never to be seen again. As regular readers will know I always prefer secondhand furniture. It is better built, better priced and offers the chance to get creative. I love bring a new lease of life into something that someone else has gotten fed up of.

So I was looking for ages for the right chest of draws in our brilliant local Age Concern furniture shop. It needed to be wooden, but real wood not mdf. It needed to be chunky and feel solid but not be a big old beast because the space in our second bedroom is a bit tight. Finally I came across this one which fit all my requirements and was a snip at £40.


I started by spending a good couple of hours on Pinterest (when is that ever wasted time?!) and got some inspiration for something a bit different for this piece given that it is going into a nursery. As I have done a fair bit of furniture revamping I have a little stock of paints to play around with so I didn't need to spend any more money on getting a different colour.

After sanding I set about painting the front of the draws and the whole outer unit in Laura Ashely Eggshell Eau De Nil that I previously used for my SewingTable Revamp. This needed about three coats to get a really nice coverage. I painted the inside of the draws using some left over Annie Sloan Chalk Paint in white which just needed a couple of coats for a good coverage.



After everything was dry I used a stencil I had made, just using card and scissors, to stencil on this Orla Kiely-esk pattern to the front of the drawers using the Annie Sloan paint. It is by no means perfect up close and I used a fine brush that I use for painting pictures (you know the artist kind!) to do some of the edge that got a bit rough. 

Overall, though, I really like this little transformation! It looks great in the room, was great value and saved another beaut from the landfill. Win!

1 comment:

  1. love it. It turned out so well. I was thinking 'ooh, that's very Orla-ish' and then saw you'd written the same thing. It's perfect.

    And yes, you are so right. Babies need so much 'stuff'! :o) x

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