寶貝熊與貓先生的生活大小事

BEFORE

Even though this coffee table was a random buy at a local thrift shop, but it would make a perfect example of demonstrating how fresh new coat of paint could totally revive the look of an old piece of furniture that you probably have lying around in the house. 

Most of the time, not all people could and had sufficient amount of fund budgeting for new furniture purchase when it came to decorate their very own first place, so from time to time, you would possibly be accepting either parent's, relative's or friend's generous offers on FREE furniture.

Sad thing is, those furniture would never match in style, shape or color; thus, there would definitely be one day that you have had enough with them sitting in your house looking dull and would like to have them donated, recycled or just dumped them once for all.  

Fortunately, with the help of furniture specialty paint, like chalk paint or fossil paint, giving them up would not be your only option in the case anymore. 

The original condition of this coffee table was splendid, no scratches, dent or cracks, and the material was certainly solid wood, that was why I only spent a spare second to debate whether to bring this guy home or not.

As you can tell, it was quite an easy decision.   

After a quick and light sanding was done, in order to create a layered and a bit distressed final look, the first layer of color I chose to put on was Chalk (white) color from Van Gogh Fossil Paint. 

Since the lighter the fossil paint color you choose, you would be able to see the wood veneer on the table top surface bleed through still with just one coat of paint.

As I mentioned above that I was aiming to create layered and distressed paint finish, so I used what was left over of Annie Sloan Chalk Paint Paris Grey color and thinned it out with a bit of Van Gogh Fossil Paint Chalk color, same as my base color, to approximately 1:1 ratio; therefore, my second layer of paint was a customized light grey color just to add depth.   

With just another layer of paint, however, the condition of wood bleeding through has been eased a lot.  

With a bit of my customized light grey color left in the can, I then decided to add another color palette into the picture, Van Gogh Fossil Paint Patina (greenish blue) color as my final layer color, so approximately 1:1 ratio again to create a layer of dreamy, watery, pastel greenish light blue color. 

When it comes to mixing paint for this specific project, there was no rocket science involved, so I was not stressed if the ratio for my customized paint color was not perfectly and exactly 1:1. 

With three colors successfully layered on top of each other, I moved on to the next stage = sanding or distressing.

A mixture of white, light grey and original wood undertone was revealed with moving my sanding block from left to right for table top, up then down for table legs, and deeply into carvings to reach for all odd corners.

I would use 2 to 3 variety of grits of sanding blocks even for a small project like this to create different degrees of distressing.  

To seal and protect these beautiful colors, Annie Sloan Clear Soft Wax was applied and lightly buffed to give the surface a mellow and soft sheen. 

Finally, one last ingredient to the recipe, Van Gogh French Caffeine (dark) Natural Beeswax was brushed on and worked into the carvings, the brush strokes and the corners to complete the vintage and shabby chic look. 

AFTER 

This piece is now restyled and suitable for staying in the house again!

The cute coffee table is perfect for shabby chic style, beach style, or farmhouse style of living room, family room, home office, and even bedroom.