Upcycled Furniture – Drab to Fab Dresser

My phenomenal hubby (with the help of a friend) kindly picked these up for me a couple of weeks ago.

They are gorgeous and solid but also unbelievably heavy and very very large. Getting them into the house was pure comedy to watch. With it still being in the midst of winter here in Canada it’s too cold to paint in the unheated garage and the cars object to being left outside in -30 ( leather seats in -30 = numb behind, so down the side of the house an into the basement these pieces had to go.

Sounds easy enough but remember I just said winter….well the side of the house is like an Olympic luge run with ice and the backyard has 2 ft of snow on it and at 10:30 at night is pitch black. Fortunately phenomenal hubby and friend found the whole thing funny ( with he odd curse word thrown in)…. The neighbours on the other hand, well I’m not sure what they were thinking but they certainly got a good show.

I’d been looking for an excuse to break out the Annie Sloan Aubusson blue chalk paint on a furniture makeover project for a while now. I’m usually a very neutral painter but wanted to push my comfort zone and experiment with something bold. This dresser with it’s amazing lines was the perfect opportunity.

Other than the top which needed a light sand to remove flaking varnish, it was in pretty good condition. Did I mention this dresser is huge??? 7 ft long and 9 large drawers..yikes

I wanted the give the inside of the drawers a pop of colour to break up the solidness of the Aubusson and make it a bit more playful. The original plan was to use duck egg blue but as much as I adore that colour it just looked blah on this piece where as Provence was perfect.

I then took my experiment a step further……mixing 1 tsp of Modern Masters Metallic paint in smoke colour with clear wax. This was applied with a chippy brush, the excess wiped off with paper towel and then buffed a few minutes later with clean paper towel ( I have to thank Kristy at 4 the love of wood for teaching me this waxing method, it really is so easy). The result made the Provence a richer lusher colour with a slight metallic glimmer and a wonderful sheen.

The exterior of the dresser was given 2 coats of Aubusson and then clear waxed to give me a good base to add Martha Stewart Metallic Glaze in Coffee, ( sadly now no longer available but a good alternative is Art Deco Metallic Glaze) to all the nooks and crannies, pushing it into the paint with a brush (I used small artists brushes to layer into the details) and wiping off the excess with fine steel wool. See how lush it looks. It darkened the Aubusson whilst giving it a beautiful sheen.

I also gave the boring chipped brass handles a makeover with  Rustoleum oil rubbed bronze which is my favourite go to for updating hardware.

Having given the glaze a couple of days to dry thoroughly, I then gave it one final coat of clear wax for protection. Here’s the end result….  (PS I nicknamed it The Tardis due to it’s size and colour)

I’d love your feedback on this upcycled furniture project.