The hutch needed a good cleaning too. I mixed bleach and water together and sprayed every area and let it sit. The next day I went to work on the actual makeover.
Although I do use chalk paint I wanted to make sure that I would't need too many coats as this was a large piece and that would be time consuming. I did some minor sanding but I also used one of my favorite items which is liquid sand paper. I use this. I bought it from home depot for about $5. You just wipe it on with a cloth and wait a few minutes. The shiny surface vanished and you have a nice base to apply paint to.
For the color, I knew I wanted a blue similar to the inspiration piece. Since I knew I had to spend money on the hardware, I wanted to try to make a color out of the left over paint from my home renovation. I came up with this color.
Now this was fun! I decided I wanted the piece to have a different finish than chalk paint. I wanted the piece to show age. I thought about some of my favorite old doors in Europe and the way the paint is not just chipping, but it bubbles and has some rough spots. To achieve this I simply didn't sift the plaster of paris, as I made the chalk paint. This left different size flecks in the paint.
At this point you can simply take your hand and wipe it over the surface to remove as much of the fleck as you want.
I did this over all of the surfaces.
Then I sealed it with a smidgen of min wax. I really liked the bright beachy look though, so I went easy on this. As I stood back it just wasn't finished. I decided I wanted her shinny! She was a happy color and I wanted her to shine. So, I used a coat of poly. When the poly met with the paint it changed the color just a bit, but I loved it. Almost a yellow old tint.
Doesn't it look like a very old door in Europe? I just love it.
For the back I wanted to use fabric instead of paint. I just wanted a different texture. I can not believe that I forgot to photograph this part, but I did. I had already pulled off the back to make painting easier. I measured the board and allowed for extra fabric to wrap around the back on each side. I bought a natural linen piece of fabric from Hobby Lobby. I laid it on the floor, put the board in the center and folded the fabric twice to form and nice clean edge. I then stapled it to the board.
I then nailed the board back onto the back of the piece with finishing nails. Lastly, I bought simple chrome hardware and screwed them on.
I was super proud of this, when I finished. So proud, that I didn't get any pictures of it outside of my work shop in natural light. Please excuse the background! I was super excited to get this into my space to do a beach colored summer booth display. I just received a phone call that she is sold. We only had a few weeks together, but she will remain a memorable display piece.
