For The Love of Mahogany
I wrote about a great dresser I found on Facebook a couple of weeks ago, the Cherry Blossom Dresser, and it's one of my all-time favorite pieces I've redone....until now! Surprising? Probably not because I think I say that every time I do a new piece. This time I'm serious though! I found this great dresser on a Facebook tag sale a couple of weeks ago and couldn't wait to pick it up. The Hubby and I drove out and picked it up and well let's just say that two of us could hardly lift it into the car. It's solid mahogany and very well built and gorgeous. It had quite a few scratches on the top and it was a bit beat up, but I had a vision for what it would look like when I was done. It had the usual great lines, details and interesting hardware I look for in a piece of furniture.
This is what it looked like when I got it home, well kind of! I did my usual get carried away and sanded the top down before I took a picture and I might have tested a bit of paint on the side too. Here it is in all it's shininess. I wish I would have taken a picture of the top before! Like it said it had some deep scratches that I wasn't sure were going to come out easily, but with a lot of sanding they went bye-bye!
One of the things I liked most about this dresser were the many details. The way the dresser bows and curves in the middle, the flowers carved in both sides and the grooves that run along the dresser all made me smile.
I didn't love the hardware, but knew that once I sprayed it with a coat of Oil Rubbed Bronze it would be just like new. The hardware is SOLID, heavy and again has a ton of character and neat detailing.
I had originally thought I would sand and stain the entire top, but then thought I'd rather do something a bit different and just sand the very top and stain that. The top of this dresser worked perfectly for this treatment.
I've really made an effort to do something a bit different with each piece of furniture I redo, whether it's the color or the paint treatment or the stain. I don't think anyone wants to see me do the same thing all the time. One of the best parts about using the Annie Sloan paint is her amazing choice of colors. There are still so many colors I haven't experimented with! I have two cans of brand new paint in fun colors that I have projects all lined up for!
This is where I tested the paint on the dresser. I had just received an order of Annie Sloan and one of the colors I ordered was French Linen. It's a color I haven't tried before and I have to say I love it!!! Wait until you see how this color looks on the finished product!
Here you can see a bit better what I was mentioning earlier. I only sanded the very tippy top of the dresser and painted the sides of the top. I love how it turned out!
I decided to stain the top in Ebony. This is how it looked with the top stained and 2 coats of French Linen.
I didn't want to do the drawers the same color because that would be too boring, right?! I did the drawers in my favorite Old White.
I have to make a quick point here....Mahogany is a real pain to paint! I primed the drawers with Kilz and still had to paint 4 coats of the Old White on top of that to prevent the stain from bleeding through. The French Linen was better because it's darker, but there were parts where it still wanted to bleed through. I'm not so sure I want to do another mahogany piece again for awhile.
I finished it all off with a coat of clear wax. The top I put on a coat of dark wax to protect the top and also dark waxed the body of the dresser. I decided to just use clear wax on the drawers to make them pop and WOW do they pop!!!!!!
Here it is all finished and I really, really, really, really (did I write really enough?) LOVE this one!!!
I love how the hardware pops off the Off White drawers and the drawers pop off the body of the dresser!
The dark wax looks amazing on the French Linen. It really darkens and deepens the color. I love how the carved flower looks now. When you put dark wax on top of details in the dresser all those details really show up nicely.
Then there's the top! WOW, it looks incredible, no?? The one thing that makes redoing furniture the most rewarding is starting with an idea in my mind and then having it far exceed my vision. It's so much fun to take something that was nice to begin with and make it completely unique and special. I don't think you're going to walk into another home and find a piece just like this one.
I like how the dresser has the curves along the bottom it adds so much character.
I had to give that flower a close up :-)
I'm very glad I didn't stain all the way down and only did the very top.
One of the other things I loved about this dresser was the hardware on the middle section. They look like little keys in key holes when you look up close. I didn't get a good enough picture of them up close.
One thing I have to mention here is this is a big, heavy, solid piece of furniture and since I like to take my pictures outside by this pretty tree we had to move it out of the garage. Not usually a big deal, but on Father's Day it's kind of a big deal. I told the Hubby I needed to move it and then we got ready to do this and I couldn't lift my side. So we had to figure out a way to move it the 30 feet or so to the tree without me lifting and hurting my back again. We figured out how to move it using a hand truck (very tricky!) and I hurriedly took my pictures so we could move it back inside and I wouldn't take up anymore of his time. While I was taking my pictures he told me, "Make sure you get your pictures because there aren't any do-overs." Thank you Steve for being willing to take part in my crazy furniture adventures, even when it's not something you 'signed-up' to do. :-)
When I'm working on a piece of furniture I'm always excited about the outcome, but this time was a bit different. A few times today I called the Hubby in to have a look. I kept saying, "Can you believe how great this looks?!" He was sweet enough to agree with me of course. Then when I was finished I called him back out again and we both stood there staring at how pretty it was. I said my usual thing, "I love this so much I need to keep it!" He kindly reminded me that we have NO room for yet another dresser unless I planned on getting rid of something. I then asked him if he might like to trade his dresser that I recently refinished for this one. He said, "NO." Of course I knew he was right. This one is special, but it will have to find a new home. Now the search begins to find this beauty a new place to live.
Linking To