About two weeks or so ago, Jason decided to move our bed. I left work and it was against one wall, I came home, it was against another. This was no small feat, as our bed was custom made and is huge (see this blog)! Well all of a sudden, we had a TON of extra space in our bedroom! So of course I proceeded to do a dramatic overhaul. Once it is all finished (I’ve got all the components there, I’m just missing the knick knacks to adorn the space), I’ll definitely blog about it, but today is just about my amazing find on Craigslist, and a little bit of paint.
I love reading. That’s relevant because when I decided we needed a piece of furniture to take up some space, I decided it either had to be a fireplace or a bookshelf (reading!), or preferably both. My problem was that every single mantel/bookshelf hybrid I could find was hundreds or even a thousand dollars! I’d just about given up hope when I found this on Craigslist:
A hundred dollars later and I was in business!
Originally I went into my local antique shop (Vintage 615– Jamie helped me and was amazing!) looking for white chalk paint, because I was told that it required no sanding or priming (which is true!!!). Unfortunately they were out, but the amazing staff took a lot of time with me to figure out something else to do instead. Saturday was my one and only no-photoshoot Saturday until December, so this was my last chance, and I couldn’t wait for the paint to come in. I decided on Mam’s Boy Blue and Chivalry Gray by Van Gogh and also bought their furniture makeup antiquing glaze. The paint was nice and thick, and as advertised, needed no sanding or priming! Here’s what it looked like after the colors were added (these are iphone pictures by the way, don’t hate):
Obviously BEAUTIFUL colors and so complimentary. I just fell in love with this paint. So next I added the furniture makeup. I was pretty unsure of what to do, so I trial and error-ed the bottom one first. I figured out quickly that it was best to spread is evenly with the grain of the wood, and not slop in on one spot and hope to move it around. My first try looked like this:
Definitely not awful, but a little rough. Eventually I got the hang of it and the final piece looks like this:
I distressed some of the edges a little bit too with sandpaper. I love the way it turned out, and believe me it looks even better in person! So the final step was decorating! I decided to use the items that were previously on our “wedding wall” in our apartment. Jason and I both loved having a spot dedicated to that amazing day, and since it’s been sitting in the closet even since we moved in, this was the perfect occasion to bring them out. Tada!!
What do you think?!
Comments