side tables Archives - Revive. Refresh. Restore. Lakeside Restoration

Maybe it’s because it’s been a LONG winter in Upstate NY; or perhaps it’s because our family just returned from visiting the beach in Florida; maybe it even has something to do with the obsession I have had with painting furniture either black or white or black or off-white…But I felt the need for some Cheesy Fun Furniture!I busted out of my rut by jumping into some FUSION Midnight Blue (OK, not so different from Coal Black, but it’s a start!) and a little reverse stencil staining on top of this great (heavy) oak side table.

I started by cutting the shape of an anchor out of contact paper and placing it on the previous finish. Then, I used a darker stain to cover the surface. Once dried, I peeled off the contact paper and gently sanded to bring the surface level.

That was fun!

I tried a similar technique on the whale and waves after painting the table legs….you guessed it – Little Whale Blue from the Tones for Tots FUSION line. However I preferred not to bring the tabletop much darker and it wasn’t a strong image, so I ended up covering that with a traditional stencil and washing it with Homestead House’s Driftwood stain & finishing oil. I think it’s just Cute!

But that’s not all…then I went totally off the wall and made this:

Yes, that is FUSION’s Coral stenciled with a picture of coral in metallic brushed steel. It’s just so bright and FUN – you can’t help but smile when you look at it!

Ahhh, so that has been my beachy, nautical adventure in painting this week. I hope it also brings smiles to many other faces! What fun color or technique do you want to try on a piece but haven’t because you convince yourself it’s too silly? I say Go For It – it’s just paint and wood – what real harm can it do? …and it might just turn out Beautiful!

Yellow, gold and pink. I’m not sure the “before” pics provide the full experience of 60 year-old, dingy, gunk-in-the crevices state of this furniture. The streaky yellowed color resembled the tar on the walls of a smoking room. While the rose marble was really beautiful (and flawless), sitting atop the yellow and gold bases made it appear rather tacky and crass at first sight.

We received a house-full of french provincial furniture from the original owners who purchased it new as newlyweds. This has provided an almost endless supply of projects – many of which will be documented here in future posts.

I was very nervous about having slabs of marble
lying around the garage – it’s too expensive and too permanently breakable for me. So, the marble topped tables were
clearly the first candidates for repair and restoration.

The repairs were pretty straightforward and included filling a few gouges, gluing a loose joint here and there and adding some structural support screws.

After scrubbing with TSP substitute (twice), it seemed the toughest part was finding the right shade of creamy white to show off the rose marble while subtly highlighting the french details of the pieces. After many tries, I settled on the perfect hue. As you can see here, flipping a detailed piece upside down to access all of the crevices is the most effective way to ensure a thorough paint job; (and I can throw in a load of laundry while coats are drying!). A thorough sanding of all surfaces, including the patches, a few coats of paint with light sanding in between, and a final coat of polycrylic for durability (and easy future cleaning!) and this set was ready for it’s new home.

I love how the carved wood details subtly show off the distinctive lines of the pieces without having to use the previously overdone gold highlights.