4 Chairs that nobody wanted

Once upon a time. there was a hopeful doe eyed mama remixer who walked into the GoodWill with an open heart. She walked straight to the 4 gloomy chairs that looked gothic in style and in emotion.  They were slightly disobedient and depressed but she could see there inner beauty, hope and light, but then a vampire dressed as a zombie came out of the bathroom and started flying towards her, wait... no that did not happen.  Just wanted to see if you were paying attention.  So anyways she picked them up and bought them... The End... except it's not the end.  She brought them home, sanded them got them some new clothes helped them see their potential and gave them a new and better home.  They now believe they can do anything.  And the remixing mama has saved another piece of furniture's life.  See for yourself.. I think they might be making a movie out of this soon and some of the previous remixes will be on the red carpet in support.

The 40's NEVER looked so GOOD!

My hair dresser text me and asked me if I'd be interested in her dining room table and chairs.  It was a family heirloom type piece.  When she sent me a picture of it I immediately told her to take to some place where she could get exactly what it was worth.  She declined and asked me to make her an offer.  I did, she agreed and I was now able to bring home a little piece of her family. This table is from the 1940's .  It had 2 leafs and 10 chairs.  I decided to keep 4 of the chairs separate and use them with a different table.  This table top is gorgeous it's downright unfair.  The chairs have this curvy woodwork on the front that is so beautiful and unique.  For being so old it is in exceptional condition.  It went from the 40's and that attic to a bright coastal relevant stunning show stopper of a piece. If I do say so myself.  I absolutely love how she turned out.

Puttin' on her makeup

This is my 1st video clip.  I couldn't resist keeping this goodness to myself.  I love a good before and after as I'm sure has become obvious given that's basically what this entire blog is about.  But one that is happening right before your eyes is even better.  Something as simple as a thin coat of paint on entricate detailed wood is so fun to remix because all of that craftmenship just jumps off the furniture once it's painted.  It's sort of lost before that.  Hope you enjoy this quickie.  

Desk Feaux Pa

So Nobody's perfect right?  This desk from American Drew Furniture company was that same old 80's dated look.  I thought I would do something a little different with it.  So I sanded each drawer down and stained it a dark walnut color, then proceeded to paint the rest of the desk this awesome emerald green color.  I seriously thought it was awesome. And you know what?  I still do.  But apparently I'm THE only one who thinks so. I can't sell this puppy.  So after lowering the price several times and being stood up a few other times I finally relented and painted it another color.

 To this clean and safe white.  Here is the problem... Still no sale. Any suggestions?  I'm asking 100.00 which is really fair I think considering its a nice brand name with 4 working drawers, solid wood and the original matching chair.  Also I have now painted it twice so if it doesn't go I guess it'll be mine instead.  I know most of my followers aren't too big on the whole leaving a comment thing, but would y'all mind chiming in on this one?  The artistic side of me doesn't really like a whole lot of advice, because then it sort of takes away from my creativity, but the business side of me desperately wants to figure this puzzle out.  I usually sell stuff promptly but this puppy has me confused.

p.s. the craziest part is it's gotten pinned quite a few times when it was the green color, so it must not be too hideous.... right?  Unless it's in someone's board called "hideous redo's"

My mama's dining room

Saturday mornings in my household are usually hoppin' we have somewhere to be, something to clean up, something to paint, a birthday to celebrate, something to set up or just something. period.  But once in a very blue moon we are free.  So I woke up one Saturday on such a blue moon and me and the hubs went to a garage sale and found a sweet dining room set just for us.  It is THE EXACT same set my mama has had for 25 plus years.  Thomasville shiny cherry wood table with 2 extensions and foam covering, china hutch, and wet bar.  SCORE!!!! Now this might not be your idea of a fantastic dreamy Saturday but for me it was SUCCESS!  Although this set is pretty nice as is, the seat cushions had been left out in the rain and were all mil-dewy and stained.  Apparently there was an ugly divorce and some furniture ended up outside in the rain.. People can be so childish but the silver lining is that I got a sweet set to redo. 

Another one bites the dust!

 

A man was once walking on the beach when he noticed a young child picking up starfish and casting them back into the ocean.  There were hundreds upon the shores and the man thought the effort futile.  He approached the child and said you'll never be able to save them all, there are simply too many.  You can't possibly make a difference.  The young child picked up another starfish and simply said. It made a difference to that one.

So I paraphrased, from memory that fable about everything we do matters to someone. Every effort we make can change something.  Here is my futile effort to change all the depressing brown chunks of furniture into illuminating and inspiring pieces of home! One Brown hutch/armoire/dresser/table at a time!

 

 

 

 

 

Lighten up the bedroom

The 80's orangey oaky furniture strikes again, but we've got it's number.  A little ( okay  A LOT ) of sanding, some stain a can of paint and a can of black spray paint.  This bedroom felt a little small with all of this solid wood chunky furniture.  Just changing the color lightened and brightened and expanded the whole room.   We cleaned up the pulls and sprayed them black and the rest we just painted with Sherwin Williams Creamy white color and used the sander to distress random areas.  The client loves this bedroom set all over again.  Like she did 35 years ago when she first bought it.  So glad it gets an extended life.

Table Remix for a friend

I like working with a client that's also a friend.  In some ways all of my "client" become my friends.  We bond over furniture.  We really do.  This client was a friend first and a client second so we bonded over other things, but then came the remix and now we have new things to bond over.  Okay enough here is the remix.
 Another orangey oak 80's table.  I actually love these.  Ya wanna know why?  Because they turn into the BEST remixes of all.  They have such pretty grainy tops and solid wood.  No dinky sleek hollow legs on the table or chairs. No pressed wood either.  I'm so glad the 80's gave us hairspray legging's great music and orangey oaky tables and chairs.. Here's to you 80's! This friend turned client had a specific set of rules for remixin' which I'm good with.  No floral, and nothing too Poppy  going on with the seat covers.  We went with a cool geometric design and warm colors.  After sanding completely down the top we used a minwax dark walnut stain, personally my very very favorite for table tops and the chairs were a Sherwin Williams black.  I think it turned out beautifully what do you think?

FACE LIFT

Oh honey.  Who did your work?  Veneer is like the furniture 80's version of a bad botched botox job, am I right or am I right?  I mean I think I'm pretty spot on.  By a raise of hands who actually sees veneer and is like "Oh baby I wanna get witcha and take yo pictcha"?  Nobody that's who.  So when me and the hubs were on the hunt and spotted this furniture version of Joan Rivers, we decided to open our hearts and our tool box and give this bad boy a facelift.  First we popped, peeled and scraped that veneer right off.  The tricky part was the leftover glue on the wood.  That was a pain.  We actually couldn't get it all off no matter how much we sanded and no matter how low the grit on the paper was.  But we filed it down so it was pretty smooth.  Next we sanded it.  The top of the dresser was GORGEOUS, once we started sanding the old nasty paint off.

              THE STRUGGLE IS REAL

Okay I just found out, as I was blogging that this MARVELOUS piece of furniture was custom built and the glass piece on top was filled with the lady's grandbabies pictures.  How do I know this?  My dear friend saw this on facebook and messaged me asking where I bought this piece from.  When I told her she proceeded to tell me all about this piece and how it was specially built for her grandma in Hickory, NC in 1968.  So then of course I felt terrible about calling it Joan Rivers, but she said that I could so I kept it in the opening line.  It was a good lesson though.  If you're going to make fun of furniture on social media make sure it's not your friend's grandma's specialty piece.  A lesson I doubt I'll ever have to face again, but I digress.  LOOK again at that wood.  It is so beautiful I can't even stand it.  It's like a zebra.

We used mixwax dark walnut (surprise) it is my favorite and looks good on every single piece. Then covered it with polyurethane and brought out such a beautiful warmth to the top.  I mean just look at that.  Is it not unreal?  The color is a Sherwin Williams sample color and I thought it was emerald green, but when we got home it looked more like Kelly green or a lily pad color, but I still really liked it. I thought about drilling holes and putting gold knobs on the drawers but I decided to leave it as is.

I sure hope it finds a great home after all the hard work that went into this statement piece, but also because knowing the history of it makes it that much more special.

Aging with beauty

This BROYHILL thrift store table, was OVER the HILL.  Probably late 80's early 90's and boring.  Nicely built but blah.  Solid wood but same old same.  Meaning pretty much every single middle class person has had this in their home, their best friends home or their grandmas home... Why?  Because they were beautifully made and solid wood.  There wasn't and isn't anything wrong with this table, other than what I just stated.  

  They're everywhere.  I, myself have redone quite a few of these Broyhill bad boys.  Decorating has come a long way in the sense that it's much more unique than it used to be.  Our parents generation and beyond worked really hard and put their hard earned money into things that were meant to last, like homes, furniture and their children.  Those tables, like those houses were well built and solid, but they were also ALL THE SAME!  So new generations that admire and are humbled by past generations ideals and work ethic pay homage by not chucking that stuff but reimagining it.  We shouldn't keep it just to keep it if it's not "speaking to your style or personality" just to please parents.  If they want us to have it then they should let us also LOVE it.  Here is how I LOVE IT!

After sanding and sanding and then sanding we stained the table top and leaf with minwax dark walnut.  Iooked GAWGEOUS.  We sanded and sanded and sanded the 6 chairs until our hearts content.  Then i got to painting.  And I must say I painted, and painted and painted.  Much more than normal.  I think that because we sanded so much the wood was extremely thirsty and just kept soaking up all of the paint.  So after many many coats and strokes of paint we were happy, then onto reupholstering those beautiful formal chairs. Again they're beautiful, but so formal that most homes can't quite cosmetically accommodate the look and quality of our homes' decorations nowadays. After all the sanding, staining, painting, reupholstering we still had the AGING WITH BEAUTY part to do, which means a little bit more sanding and then finally the makeup... ie: the waxing.  An important part of any beauty regimen is WAXING. I began to wax, and wax and wax. This table was a labor of labor.  Seriously it was hard work but it paid off because it went to a beautiful family of 5 that I just know will enjoy it and let it live on for years to come!

 

 

 

Mismatched.com

This REMIX should be named mismatched.com because they really come from 2 different worlds.  One is a small wooden kitchen table, meant for a nook or sun room.  The chairs are metal and look like they could be sitting outside of a metal looking camper... see what I mean?

But with this table being so tiny these chairs were PERFECT for them to become a great match.  A match made in my garage.  The chairs were dainty enough to go with a dinette and this table had chalk paint on the top so we had to sand the crap out of it to get it back to a blank slate.

I had leftover fabric from one of my chair redo's. SCORE!  I love when I get to reuse a fabric.  I feel so thrifty and economic.  I decided since it was a dinette set to go a little funky with the colors and design.  Hoping for an apartment or condo type place for this beaut.... and that's exactly what I got.  A gal purchased this who moves quite a bit and lives Downtown Charleston and has limited spaced.  A perfect match.

The fabric came from Jo-Ann's and the paint is the Annie Sloan knock of that Lowes sells.  So since I brought it up I'm going to rate it.  NOT WORTH IT.  Great colors, but WAY overpriced and it didn't save me any time at all.  In fact I probably did more layers of paint than usual.  I don't particularly care for chalk paint anyways but I really won't be buying it again.