Antique End Table

The new owner of the antique empire wardrobe picked up a neat little end table and asked me to refinish it for her.  It had previously been painted red with a heavy dark stain on top of it.

My client wanted the red paint removed and to have it repainted in Old White with some distressing.  I decided to try something a little different this time.  Instead of using a chemical stripper, I used the Wagner Heat Gun.  It was such a time saver and definitely less messy.  It does come with its own quirks though.  You need a lot of ventilation (outside is best) because the smell of burning paint is not pleasant at all.  You also need to keep the heat on the paint as you are scraping.  Now this isn't too hard on a flat surface, but it was a little tricky on those legs.

Here is a video of the heat gun in action!

And this is what the little table looked like after I removed all of the paint.  The top was pretty rough.  It had a good sized split and lots of bumps and bruises.  But those legs...those legs were just gorgeous!!

Old White chalk paint is a little tricky to use.  It is a little thin and I'm going to say 90% of the time you will have bleed-through when using it.  Something about the chalk paint really pulls the tannins out of the wood.  It makes your paint look like it has a pink fungus growing out of it.  So before I put even thought about painting this table, I put a coat of poly on it.  Poly is the only thing that will block the tannins from leaking through.

I still ended up using 3 coats of Old White on this piece.  I painted the inside of the drawer in Antibes green.  Then I finished this piece off with a new to me wax, CeCe Caldwells clear wax.  It is made of all natural ingredients and safe for the environment.

 I just love the way it turned out.  Old made old again!

What great pieces have you found lately?

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Waterfall Dressing Table/Vanity

I wanted to take a moment and share more pictures of the waterfall dressing table that I had completed.  The pictures in the original blog post were taken in my office/painting room and the lighting was very poor.

Have another look at this beautiful piece!

This piece was painted in Annie Sloan Chalk Paint in the colors Paris Grey, Old White, and Arles.

Waterfall dressing table & Annie Sloan Chalk Paint

I have many irons in the fire right now.  However, I wanted to take a minute and show you a piece I recently completed.

I purchased this waterfall dressing table from one of my favorite pickers, Gail, of Blue's Junk & Primitives.  She finds the best "rusty junk".  

This piece was in great shape structurally, but the finish left little to be desired.  A light sanding to knock off the flaking finish and some Annie Sloan Chalk Paint to the rescue!  

 I chose Paris Grey and Old White for the dressing table.

The handles are some type of metal that had a brass-type overlay.  They also had a little surface rust to them.  I gave them a good cleaning and they just weren't very pretty.  So I decided to paint them in Paris Grey and give them a white-washed look with Old White.  I finished them in Soft Wax and a very light coat of Dark Wax.

I gave it some light distressing to give it that well-loved and worn feel.

 I used a stencil on each end just to give it a little extra "bling".

And here she is in all her lovely chalk paint glory!  

She's come a long way from her old neglected self.  I think she would be great as a table behind someone's sofa, a great little laptop desk, or as a dressing table in a little girl's room.

So what do you think of this piece?  Would you have chosen these colors?

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