Dining Buffet - Before And After

A few months ago, I was given the opportunity to try out a new line of paint.  However, I was waiting for the right piece to try it out on!  That took a little longer than expected.  But good things really do come to those who wait because I ended up landing the most beautiful dining buffet at the most beautiful price. :)

I knew I would be painting the body of the table light grey as well as upgrading the hardware.  But I wasn't quite sure what to do for the top of the table until I saw this photo from  Confessions Of A Serial Do-It-Yourselfer.  If you haven't checked out Christy's blog, do it!  She does some really fun things!

Source

Inspired by Christy, I knew I wanted to do a very dark stain on the top of the buffet as well as the small strip inbetween the two drawers.  So to work I went!

I started with three coats on the drawers and doors.

 And then got to work on the body.  Here is the first coat...

 And here she is with three coats!  Looking good!

The whole piece (except the top) then got a bit of distressing.  Here is a pic of the doors and drawers.

 

I prepped the already painted areas for the stain.  You can go two routes with this particular type of stain - 1) paint it on and wipe it off, repeat or 2) just paint it on, repeat.  I went with the latter and LOVED the results.

 

And here she is!!! 

I love the mix of original hardware with some new!  And since I decided to keep this piece (I just HAD to!!) I lined the drawers with teal paper to match my living room lamps.  Here she is in our real life, ha....

-Ashley

Dining Buffet Redo

I had been wanting to redo a dining buffet for quite some time and one December day, thanks to Craigslist, I found this beauty for a great price AND in fantastic condition - score!  I always knew I wanted to go black on the exterior - simple, yet elegant - but the possibilities on what to do on the inside were endless!  I spent quite a few nights tossing ideas back and forth with the hubby (bless his heart!). I thought, why don't I just start and I'll figure it out as I go, which by the way is soooo against my norm!

I had also just taken an advanced techniques class from The Rustic Duchess (if you ever have wanted to learn how to paint furniture, definitely check her classes out - super fun!).  In the class, we worked with glacage, which is an embossing creme that you use to stencil designs right on to your piece.  Then when you paint over it, it looks as if it was always part of the original piece.  Love it!

I started off by painting the drawers and doors black.  I like to paint drawers and doors first so that when I get the main piece finished up, I can immediately start putting everything back together. Instant gratification. :)

I also knew that I wanted to try lining the drawers with paper.  After doing a little research, I decided to line the drawers with a soft grey design using Krylon Spray Adhesive.  This process was super easy!  Just cut, spray and line.  The adhesive is very forgiving, making it easy to adjust the paper as needed. 

I thought I would seal it with Modge Podge, but unfortunately that back fired.  Luckily, I only tried it out on one of the drawers, but you can see how wrinkled everything became.  

After doing even more research, I decided that not sealing the paper would be the route I'd go so that if someone wanted to remove it and or switch it out - they could easily do so.  Next time, I think I'll try lining with fabric!

With the drawers and doors painted, it was time to make a call on the inside.

Considering I already had grey in my paint stash, the decision on color was a simple one.

And for a bit of a surprise, I decided to paint stripes on the shelf and the inside of the doors.

After the inside was finished, it was time to tackle the body.

And then I finished up with a little distressing - my favorite part!

Viola - just as I had envisioned!

I have my heart set on doing a coffee table next, just got to find the right piece.  At least I already know the color - red!!!

-Ashley