Happy Tuesday! Hope you all had a great weekend! It was a wet and gray one here and I took the opportunity to finish a book I’ve been reading. These days I tend to read 10 pages and fall asleep, even if I love the book, so I welcomed the chance to have Chris home to help with the baby so I could read the book I started a month ago. I’ll be sharing my thoughts on it soon! Today I wanted to show you a dresser I recently finished for my space at Sweet Clover this month. Truth be told, I’ve had this piece for a while in my space, but it just sat there. All wood pieces are a hard sell, to be honest, so this one needed a bit of attention to appeal to our customers. Wood lovers, please don’t hate on me this furniture makeover: white framed wood midcentury dresser. (This post contains some affiliate links.)
There’s a bit of a story here, first of all, on the kindness of strangers when it comes to how this dresser makeover came to be. You see, I found it at a local thrift store and debated purchasing it because it was missing one of its original drop pulls and only had the back plate. The backplate was mounted with two screws, so I couldn’t just remove all the hardware and add knobs… I needed something that could cover the holes from the backplate or I needed the exact same pull. I searched on etsy and ebay and even googled, and I couldn’t find a match for the pull available anywhere. I decided to purchase the dresser anyhow and figure something out. I knew it meant I’d have to fill holes and paint those pretty detailed drawers. To be perfectly honest here, I didn’t want to paint those drawers… my sander couldn’t fit between those ridges so everything would have to be hand sanded and the thought of that gave me nightmares. (If you look at the lower left drawer below in the photo you will see the pull that’s missing.)
Well, let me tell you, I got lucky! I was searching for inspiration for this piece, and looked at one of my favorite furniture instagram feeds, CMB World Designs. I’ve followed Katie for a while and she does amazing work, especially on midcentury dressers. Katie had finished the same exact dresser with its matching nightstand and painted the drawers. They turned out beautifully, as you can see here:
I messaged her to let her know how lovely they were and I told her I had just purchased the same dresser but it was missing a pull, so I had been scrolling for inspiration. She messaged back and told me she thought she happened to have an extra pull laying around and would love to send it to me. What?!?! I was shocked! A week later the new pull was in my hands. I am so grateful to Katie for sending it to me. For one, it was just an incredibly kind gesture, and secondly, it saved me from sanding all those drawers. Props to Katie for doing that on her piece. 🙂
With all of its hardware in tact, I brought it to Sweet Clover in all of its wood glory. I personally loved it and could see it in my own home with its wood finish.
However, the customers at Sweet Clover could not visualize it in their own homes and it sat for a few months. I decided after I had the baby it was time to bring it home and give it a little makeover.
For this makeover I used the following supplies:
- Orbital sander
- 180 grit sandpaper
- 2 Purdy paint brushes
- Kilz oil-based primer
- General Finishes Snow White
- Clean Rags
- Black Bison Clear Wax
To begin, I removed all of the drawers and set them out of the way. I then sanded the entire piece with my orbital sander and 180 grit paper. When I was finished with that, I removed the sanding disc from the sander, and used it to hand sand the areas my sander couldn’t access. After it was sanded, I wiped it clean with a dam rap to remove any dust left behind.
Next came priming the dresser. Whenever I am going to paint a white modern finish, I used this this oil based primer because it offers the most solid backing and the best adhesion. It stinks to high heaven and I only use it when I can work outside. I use an older Purdy brush that is close to retiring to apply the primer… Once I use it with the primer it’s pretty much trashed, so I never use a new brush with it. I do find that it is best to use a quality brush as lower quality will leave thicker brush marks as well as drop bristles on the piece. I applied the first coat of primer and followed the grain of the wood. So that I could use my brush again on the second coat, I wrapped it several times in clear cling wrap and put it in a sealing plastic bag. After the first coat was dry, I used my sander to once again sand all over just to smooth out my primer lines since this primer can go on rather thick. I then applied a second coat of primer and repeated those steps.
Now I was ready to paint the dresser, which seems to go so quickly after applying primer which feels like such a slow process. I used a Purdy brush again and applied 3 coats of General Finishes Snow White paint, allowing drying time in between, of course.
After the paint dried, I used a clean rag (I love to use these boxes of rags) to apply my favorite hard finishing and non-toxic wax, Black Bison clear. After the wax dried, I used another clean rag to buff the finish to make it nice and hard and give it a pretty sheen.
I am really happy with how it turned out, and am thrilled that I was able to keep those original pulls and avoid painting those drawers. 😉
Chris and I hauled this dresser back over to Sweet Clover this past weekend and it will be available at our next sale, which is also our huge annual yard sale full of amazing deals! I’ve also brought over the navy and wood midcentury dresser I shared with you just last week.
Sweet Clover Annual Yard Sale
June 15-17
Friday and Saturday 9-5, Sunday 11-4
If you’re looking for any of the supplies I used to redo this dresser, you can find them below. Hope your week is off to a great start!