Yes I did actually buy it, and haul it home, with the intentions of refinishing it into something fabulous! I tend to be so blind to small imperfections and details that I totally missed the smell of cat pee coming off of the base board. It was truly disgusting. There was even a bonus mouse skeleton included inside… what a lovely surprise. Had I known what I was getting myself into I might have not gone through with it. Something about it though, the shape, the lines, drew me… and I knew it could be so much more (yes I am serious… stop laughing). To this day I still can’t believe my husband trusted me on this. He almost didn’t let me take it home, and he wasn’t too happy when I asked him to help me paint it. However here are the results of all our sweat and tears.
I know, they are divine aren’t they! Okay so I am a little proud… who wouldn’t be! That was a heck of a lot of work. How… you ask? First there were the obvious problem areas to take care of. The dresser smelled of old lady, and cat pee. From the before photos, you might notice a dark stain on the bottom board, this was the ‘pee’ in question, so this board had to be removed and replaced. A simple 2×4 from the local hardware store did the trick. We then wiped the dressers down with disinfectant, and proceeded to prime the entire thing, inside and out with Glidden Gripper Primer. This negated the need to sand, although I think we did sand it a little. After 24 hours were up, it was dry and we were able to proceed to the base coat. Here is the dresser complete with base coat and new drawer pulls.
I was almost going to leave the dresser like this, but it broke my heart because it was so blah. An improvement, but still blah. I had envisioned so much more, and was fearful of ‘ruining’ it with sponge painting or something horrible like that. So we lived with it for about a year (this is that awe-inspiring/procrastinator thing I was referring to). Anyway… as an aside (which I promise is related), I am strangely attracted to all things Martha Stewart. I tend to flock towards, products, ideas, pictures, and the general creative genius of Martha. It’s completely unintentional! Mind you I am absolutely nothing like her! In fact, I don’t even like to admit that I am attracted to her stuff! I just am, it’s crazy… I’ll be in a store or online and I’ll start gravitating to anything that has anything to do with Martha! MARTHA, MARTHA, MARTHA! There is nothing really wrong with Martha Stewart, I just don’t want to seem like a groupie or something. Because I’m not!
Back to the dressers. Sadly I was almost ready to kick those dressers to the curb, or try to garage sale them when I decided what the heck… let’s just try something, anything to salvage my dignity. Along came my good ole’ pal Martha.
I came looking for metallic paint, and Martha pulled through, like she always does. I was totally going to just buy some silver metallic paint, but there were all the other colors that were intriguing in the Martha Metallic Glaze collection. Also bought the cool Martha faux painting tools.
“How did you do that cool texture on the drawers” you say? Meet my other love, besides Martha, Anaglypta wallpaper! This kind of wallpaper has been around since the Victorian era. In its current state you can purchase it as a pre-pasted, paintable, paper. I love how it looks like a tin ceiling! Thank you Menards for keeping it in stock…. please, please, please, never remove it from your shelves, it will NEVER go out of style! I bought an entire roll for $12, and I have tons left over… I see a cool back splash for the kitchen in our future. Here are a few photos me wallpapering a dresser.
Here is a quick recap of how to do this to your furniture:
– Buy old cat pee dresser set
– Disinfect… acid bath?
– Sand or trust the Gripper Primer to do its job (adhere to any surface, no sanding needed). Primer is necessary in either case, wait 24 hours before painting base coat. Even though it may seem dry after only a few hours, you will need more time when applying multiple layers of paint as in this situation.
– Apply wallpaper (don’t forget, measure twice… cut once). This is not how I did it, since I changed my mind after I thought I finished them. However I recommend doing it before the base coat. I also recommend spending the extra $2 on a tube of wallpaper seam sealer. This is basically a type of glue specially made for wallpaper that seals seams shut. Use this on all raw edges of the paper after it is completely dry. After 24 hours you can begin the next step.
– Base coat (bet you didn’t see that coming). Wait 24 hours to paint again.
– Metallic paint, and whip out those faux painting skills. I used the ‘linen dragger’ from Martha’s kit. You apply the metallic paint, then go over all areas with this specialty brush. It gave a nice texture, without being overpowering. This particular paint needed 24 hours to dry according to the package, but I waited more like 3 full days because it was ever so slightly tacky from all the coats of paint.
– After all that waiting I finished with several coats of lacquer to protect the finish using Krylon’s spray lacquer.
It is extremely satisfying to know that we completed such a daunting task at a cost still less than buying cheap furniture from Wal-Mart. With experience working for an interior designer, I know how much furniture that looks like this can cost. So for me, this is worth the time and effort. And I am happy to have my dignity still intact, all thanks to Martha!