Luggage Chest

    This is a project that was long in coming: I had to find just the right pieces. 
First came the trunk handle ends, they were on clearance at Van Dykes, my favorite furniture hardware place. I got them several years ago for a couple of bucks but the leather hand parts were still too expensive, so I waited. Next came the dresser. This particular one was given to me for free and it was perfect for this project! Home-made but very well done; number 2 yellow pine throughout.
Now, what to do about the handles: what do I have that's leather?...
Oh yeah, my old stirrup leathers! Perfect! A little paint, a lot of detail, and did I mention the clasps for this "suitcase" cost $1 a piece? The whole creation cost me around $20!

Homemade Hutch

    This next project is a cabinet with a hutch. The cabinet came from a store closing- it had no doors but lots of possibilities...

I wanted something tall for my store, but nothing had materialized so I had to build the hutch myself...

The whole shelf (with doors) needed 18ft of 1x12 pine and a role of hardware cloth.

The two pieces were painted with a grey mistint, then dry - brushed with white. I backed the hutch with 1/4" plywood painted aqua to highlight the white pieces inside.

Then for the upper doors I attached wire screen inside door frames so any knick-knacks could be displayed proudly and put on knobs that looked like birds with matching glass colored handles my daughter had left over from her kitchen for the bottom doors.

French Provencial Bench

     I just have to show this collaboration effort. It was done before I discovered blogging, so there are no before pictures, but it's easy to see what went on. My friend, Kyle, had this king-sized headboard he didn't know what to make with. It is French Provencial with framed wicker panels. He normally curb-shops, but he waited this one out at a thrift shop for only $5. A short while later, my daughter dragged a French Provencial coffee table in off the curb and the two pieces landed close to each other. As luck would have it, the Wisteria catalog arrived and on the cover was a beautiful French Provencial bench, that we drooled over and - "hey wait a minute!"... If you put the wicker panels on top of the coffee table, there's the bench!!! The ochre color was a mistint and the cushion was made from a thrift store curtain. Perfection!!!

Cowboy Desk

    This little desk had spent years in the humidity of a produce locker. It was moldy and hairy and had spider balls all over, not to mention duct tape on its legs. Nothing was broken or missing so it was a quick sanding job, primer on it's formica top and porch paint on its legs. Porch paint is a wonderful thing for pieces that involve children because it's so durable. The cowboy came from the Graphics Fairy , a wonderful blog spot to find great graphics, and a clear coat of shellac to finish it off.

Thank you very much Graphics Fairy!

Bird-side table

      This is a pretty straight forward redo, nothing really hard involved.  I found this table at a yard sale (sorry, no picture) for $10.00.  I usually don't pay this much for a small piece, but it was so cute!  As it turned out, the former owners had used it to store thier spare change, and a lot of it got caught in the interior plywood so after trucking it home and pulling out the drawers, I got a hefty sum of $3.65 for my trouble.  I saw it in a soft turquoise and painted it that way originally.  Now I don't remember why I covered the blue with yellow, but I think I like it better now.  Anyway the picture on top was in a calendar from last year and it just fit the top with a little cropping.  Since the top veneer was peeling, I cut a piece of  1/4 inch plywood to fit where it had been and attached the picture.  I'm sure everyone has their own way of glueing paper down, and it seems each different type of paper requires something different.  For this paper, since it was so heavy, I sprayed the back and the front with clear satin finish so it wouldn't absorb so much water, then used ModPodge to adhere it.  The satin variety looked really nice on the textured paper, so I covered it with a couple of more coats and glued and nailed the whole thing on to the top of the chest. Really quick, but really cute.



Again... Furniture and More: How to repurpose a French Provencial Chest...#links

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How to repurpose a French Provencial Chest...

   The first thing I have to show you is: What to do with a French Provencial Chest of drawers.

It wasn't the best piece of furniture to begin with, but the carcass was solid. The non-wood drawers were throw-away.

    Now I have a fairly deep set of very short shelves - no good.

By removing the divider between the two top drawers and the bottom three drawers, you get two cubbies of decent size. As you probably know, the drawers are separated by wood and cardboard. The wood is usually attached to the carcass by a tenon, which is easily cut with a jig saw or keyhole saw. The cardboard from the divider you want to keep should be replaced with 1/2" plywood cut to fit inside as a floor to the top cabinet. The same will be necessary at the bottom. You could stop here and use baskets inside or for toy storage, but I see a t.v. cabinet possibility:

T.V. on top, the cable box or dish receiver in the top cabinet and dvd or game storage below, so you need doors. I actually went to our vo-tech to learn to build these things (and drawers), ant they are pretty easy after practice. The two doors on top (for the receiver) need to have glass, or something the remote can transmit through, and I chose this shiny punched metal we got for free on "big trash" day. The bottom two doors are solid to hide the mess. Black hides a lot of "boo boos" and goes well with the metal plus it looks great with the lavender interior.

The key door pulls both face the same way until you reverse one and they fit together.
All together, the door pulls were the biggest expense of the whole project.