How to update your furniture – the quick and easy way
I am loving the white Scandinavian and French interior look that has been popularised by Pinterest in the last 10 years. Adding one piece of white furniture to your home can immediately make your room look bigger. I have found that buying white furniture can be both expensive and limited in terms of space capacity. It seems that most white furniture is either cheap plastic or gorgeous shabby chic French wood that can barely store a single sock within it. With this in mind I have been loving transforming old furniture that was dark wood and falling apart. I have even been known to find old mirrors in skips and rejuvenate them. I have documented my latest project which was my Italian grandmas old cabinet which my husband and I now store all our cocktail booze in. It is beautiful as it is but doesn’t fit with the rest of our interiors as it is so dark. Below I have shown you how I, as a complete “furniture rejuvenating amateur”, has updated this piece of furniture in two days – the quick and easy way with very little or no money. I actually didn’t spend a penny as I found everything I needed in either mine or my parents garage.
I painted on a very sunny day which allowed me to paint many layers in one day.
Method
1. Start by taking the doors off…this took me a while figure this out.
2. Start by sanding down all of the areas which you are going to paint. You don’t have to take off all of the old varnish or paint. You just need to provide a little bit of grip for your new paint.
3. Use masking tape to cover and areas you don’t want to get paint on.
4. Start painting. Do not use lashing of paint. Slowly build up your layers. I painted about 5 layers. After layer 3 I lightly sanded down any corners that had too much build up of paint. I also kept a chop stick nearby to scrape away any globby bits of paint that build up in the more intricate corners.
5. Once you are happy with your painting and the surfaces are completely dry you can wax all the surfaces with a buffing cloth. This will allow you to lay mugs, glasses, candles, picture frames etc on the furniture without worrying.
6. I used Brasso to do some extra buffing and shining to the trims. I actually soaked the hinges and handle in some ketchup for a while which worked wonders…this almost put me off having ketchup with chips, think of our teeth eeek. 7. Once you have screwed the the doors and handles back on, rub an old candle all over the lengths of the doors to allow them to shut with ease. 8. Et Voila☆
