Credenza: Practical meets Pretty
November 2, 2010
Last year I remodeled my home office, and it’s been a genuine pleasure working in this pretty and personalized space. For the longest time, I was loving the sofa that sat on one wall, but over time, paperwork started piling up, and I reasoned I needed a more practical solution if I really was going to run a business from home. So I made some changes!
I started with a credenza I found at (where else?) a thrift store. A few weeks ago, I stumbled across this piece for $40 dollars ~ it was the perfect size measuring six feet long and mostly solid wood, but the finish was all wrong wrong wrong. First, the top is laminate, and all scratched up. Ick. Second, the base was a different shade of honey tone wood that clashed in my eyes. Usually, I like mid century modern style furniture in a medium stain, but this two-tone finish just wasn’t working for me, so I gave it a makeover to suit my space.
Before:
After:
Slate blue/gray paint + sleek contemporary pulls + geometric pattern on top = perfect!
Some of you are probably wondering how the heck did I get such straight painted lines on this piece? Well, it was tricky, but I’ll tell ya how!
First, let’s start at the beginning. Scratched laminate top? No.Thank.You. Slick surfaces never deter me, no sirreee! My favey fave oil based primer to the rescue to cling baby cling!
Here you can see I’m painting the laminate shelf on the inside. Remember oh yes, oh yes oh yes you can paint laminate! All it takes is the right kind of primer. This is it! (You can also use the Zinsser oil based shellac in the red can too.) I roll mine on with a foam roller for speedy coverage, then follow it up with a brush to keep it all even.
Note the can says "No sanding" but people ask me all the time if that is for real. Peeps, it is fo real. BUT, that said, I always ‘scuff up’ my piece with a coarse sanding pad beforehand. Call me crazy but something inside my little brain tells me that scuffed up surface will hold the primer better, but I could just be living in a bubble. Anyway, I do scuff up my piece then I wipe it down. I don’t degloss or sand away the varnish, I simply scuff it up. Got it ? Repeat after me. Scuff scuff scuff. OK, that’s enough.
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Moving on. Knowing I was going to paint it dark, I gave the surface a quick coat of deep tint (water based) primer over the white oil based Zinsser. Why the dark primer? Because it ensures your dark paint will stay true to its color.
It’s not absolutely necessary when painting a piece dark, but I find you risk having to add an extra coat or two or three of paint, so I use a coat of dark primer cause it’s a guarantee I can get one coat coverage with my dark paint. And I can’t find a dark tint oil based primer that’s as good as Zinsser, I’m still searching.
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Next, I thought I was sooooo smart to paint the rough pattern in white, lay painter’s tape on top, then add the gray paint over the top of that. No. Bad idea. I ended up with horribly uneven lines and had to do the pattern all over again. And I know better! I had such an easy time painting stripes on this dresser so I should have followed that technique. Sadly, I didn’t and the lines were just awful.
First attempt:
This I have learned. The best way to get a straight stripe line on a flat surface is to peel up the painter’s tape while the latex paint is still somewhat wet! Don’t wait until it’s completely dry. Peel it off slowly when it’s wet. Reason being, once latex paint dries, it peels, and it takes little pieces of the stripe with it.
Therefore, I declare, wet paint is good for making stripes!
Aaaaaaand this is how I should have done the geometric pattern in the first place, but hey, this gal’s still learning. This is also a great time to mention that the final paint color on this piece is a slate blue/gray color by True Value called ‘Avoidance’. It ended up being a little bluer and less charcoal than I really wanted, but oh well. It still works!
**Please note, I have no experience painting stripes on textured walls. For those of you who have, please feel free to chime in and share your secrets for perfect stripes on textured walls. We’re listening!
I gave this credenza two coats of Polycrylic in Gloss for added sheen. Me likey shiny. Pur-tay! I also added some contemporary hardware I found at True Value.
This piece would have been just okay refinished in gray, but the addition of the sleek nickel pulls and the white geometric pattern makes it something special and one-of-a kind. I love it! It’s so nice to have all this storage for paperwork and now at last practical has met pretty.
Practical, meet pretty. Pretty, meet practical. I think you’ll get along swell.
True Value Blog Squad legalese: “I was one of the bloggers selected by True Value to work on the DIY Squad. I have been compensated for my time commitment to the program as well as my writing about my experience. I have also been compensated for the materials needed for my DIY project. However, my opinions are entirely my own and I have not been paid to publish positive comments.”
I’ll show you the entire office soon!
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Tags: credenza, thrift store find, true value
Pitch perfect, as always…I’m just impressed at the vision for that piece because I certainly wouldn’t have seen it! I just hate when my paint color doesn’t turn out quite right…but it is still absolutely lovely…now I am just dying to put that top pattern on something…*anything*!
http://loveallthingsbrightandbeautiful.blogspot.com
Beautiful job! It’s not my style, but I still appreciate how fabulous it looks!
Love it. Thanks for all the good ideas.
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! 40 bucks?!?!?!?!
Not fair-but I’m happy for you :)
First off, after I ‘discovered’ your blog, I have spray painted everything in my house including, a buffet, 5 chairs, kitchen table and a door. All verym very lovely–in fact I think I have permanent colored nasal hairs now (I wear a mask but it always seeps in) and I love it!
But here’s my stupid question:
How in the world do you get all your thrift shop furniture home? My hubby works 9-5 so that’s out for his help, we have a truck but it’s yucky and stays home most of the time, weekends are a nightmare at thrift shops, and last even if I were to take the old truck ‘thrift shopping’I can never get ANYONE to help me at the thrift stores to move furniture to the car! Maybe I am just not aggressive enough.
Give us the skinny on furniture thrifting!
Wow, thanks for answering my question about if you had posted about the credenza, I wouldn’t have wanted to miss this! AMAZING, girl. Love the gloss, the color, the pattern on top and the pulls…all of it! Great, just great! Janell
That piece is day-and-night better! I love the pattern on top and the color choice. Perfection, as always, my friend.
ok, found it! so great! i must have missed it in my facebook feed, but i did read all your thoughts on painting stripes! my mother-in-law’s hand-me-down chest is so getting striped… after her visit this weekend :) thanks!!
Thank you for linking it for me, and if I had just done a little digging I could have found it just two days prior – LOL I found a similar credenza at a thrift store, but they had taken two smaller cabinets, combined and put a top on that was TOO long (like a foot too long) and it was laminate, I wasn’t going to attempt to cut it :) I am going to keep looking, this post has inspired me!
As always, stunning and inspiring!
Very late here but I absolutely love this! I already had a crush on your office but this is fab.
Unrelated question – do you find you use your inspiration board a lot? I have a big one over the credenza in my office but so rarely put anything up there. Im wondering if its because its behind me when Im sitting down in there or maybe Im just not an inspiration board person?
I love this! That looks amazing!!! Great job : ) Thank you for sharing!
once it warms here in chicago {when I can paint in the garage without losing fingers to frostbite}…I am using this as inspiration for my husbands’ highboy from his childhood.
esp. heart the detail on top.
and the color.
swoon.
Hello! I loved your credenza top design so much that I lovingly copied it for my end table before and after. Gave you a shout out in my post. Hope you like it. You are such a great inspiration. Thanks!
http://tallglassofh2o.blogspot.com/2010/07/before-and-after-craigslist-bookshelf.html
Ooops! Here’s the correct link.
http://tallglassofh2o.blogspot.com/2010/12/thrifted-table-before-after.html
Gorgeous…and gives me much inspiration for transforming thrifty finds into “new” modern pieces. Just wanted to share a tip for painting straight lines that I just used. Works like a charm!!! Never had lines so straight and crisp. Paint your base color, let dry, and then tape your edge or your design. Then paint the edge of the tape with your base color, lightly (this creates a seal so that bleed through can’t occur). Let dry. Then paint with the edge color that you want (or design color) with a thick coat, then immediately pull off the tape. Line should be crisp with no bleed through at all if you’ve done it right. Should work pretty well on textured walls too :)
And just a shout out to your old post on grasscloth paper. We had a wall in our ranch that was covered in dull white grasscloth. We painted it a butter yellow (acutual color is Biltmore Bluff by Sherwin Williams) and it is GORGEOUS!!!! Loving the texture so much that we bought grasscloth for the opposite wall and will be hanging it and painting to match!
Thanks for all the transformations that inspire!
Love love love this! I’d never thought to paint over yukky looking laminate before. Thank you for the inspiration and the confidence to fix something like this up if I see it in a second hand store.
Wow! You are a genius and an inspiration!! I actually found an abandoned desk by the dumpster ..and i brought it to my office…its a wood piece in good condition and I was wondering what to do with it..but I think i know what I should do with it! =) Your table is sooOOOOoo BEAUTIFUL!!!
I have fallen in love w/ your blog! <3 <3 <3
I just loved this. You are so smart for how you spruced up the piece. I love your sense of style too because that is totally something I would put in my office. It has a shabby chic feel to it but honestly is much more chic. Love the color and geometric lines.
I looove this makeover! It is amazing just like everything else on your blog!!! I think I am going to recreate it on something!
You asked about painting stripes on textured walls, I have a tutorial on my blog. Here it is: http://fabulousified.blogspot.com/2012/01/perfectly-painted-stripes.html