Rattan Back Dining Chairs - Before & After

I was lucky to come across a set of amazing rattan back dining chairs. Once home I found 3 were perfect and 3 needed cane replacements.  Here is the before, worn, faded and grubby, but gorgeous backs and shapes.

I decided to do two for the Villa dining room, to use as charger chairs at the head of the table. Here are two I have refurbed so far. As I only have one good one left until I find someone who will replace the backs, I have to decide what way to do the last one. Thoughts?

White and Floral

Grey and Stencilled

Happy Painting!

American Style Tallboy in Antique White

I won this piece in an auction as I could see it had really good bones. It was shabby and neglected but with some sealer, antique white vintage paint and semi gloss poly she is now transformed:

 This is how she started off, and check out those weird drawer runners! If anyone knows about these please let me know as I have not come across them before.

And back to some great refurb photos again...I love the the combo of blue and white always!

Duck Egg Blue with White wash finish Sideboard

I have been trying different paint finishes with the Voodoo Molly Vintage paint to see what different looks I can get with it. This week I completed this lovely old sideboard, which had a pretty boring, no-body-wants-me look to it when I picked it up. Here she is.

I knew she would look good in a colour but as she was a sideboard which could end up in any room I wanted her to have a neutral look as well. Here is her after pic.

I did 2 coats of Voodoo Molly Vintage Duck Egg with light sanding in between. No sealer was required as her original finish was in excellent condition, lucky me! Then I used a mix of 2 parts water to 1 part Antique White vintage paint and used this as a wash all over her. I worked in small areas, painting it all over the dry duckegg paint , then getting my clean cloth, wiped it back. This created a very subtle wash, very even so she ended up as a soft Duck egg with depth. I think this colour suits and I am very happy with how easy this was to do with the vintage paints.

Once completed she has some lovely detail showing through that was lost when she was mahogany colour. I did a little distressing to highlight this and then kept it very simple with vintage metal hardware and a poly finish so she was durable.

Have a great week everyone

One Sideboard, Two Projects

We picked up this sideboard with excellent old coloured glass doors and not very excellent anything else. All of the handles were mismatched, the back piece was not fixed onto the base properly and the varnish was old and wearing off in places. 

In progress, painting the base, staining the top

She looks a lot prettier in this photo than what she was - photos can be deceiving, this was the purchasers photo

We decided to remove the back piece altogether but that left a gap at the back. Step in handy hubby, he took an old mirror strut we no longer required and cut it to size and fitted it to the back. I loved the old wood and sanded it all back to bare wood on the top.

One seriously shiny top

The top ended up with two coats of dark stain and a vintage wax top coat. The base was Vintage Paint in Bone China, a grey based white as I wanted to really make a feature of the gorgeous blue glass in the doors. I distressed her as she had a naturally timeworn look already and finished the body with vintage wax.

Original Hardware

The top piece is going to make me the perfect sign for the Gallery, the mirror is being made into a blackboard, the wood is being painted in Retro Blue ( my fav colour!) vintage paint and a stencil will go either side, more on that when it's finished.

Work in Progress for this sign

Stenciling Tip No. 2

This is a simple one but will improve the look of your finished stencil project. 

• Remove your stencil before your paint dries

After you have painted two very light coats of paint one straight after the other, remove your stencil straight away. This will give a nice clean edge to your stencil and ensure no sneaky excess paint creeps under your stencil while it dries. It also has the added bonus of the stencil coming away from your piece easily and not getting accidentally glued onto your piece by paint.


This is the second in my mini series of stenciling tips, I hope these are helpful, see the first one here Stencil Tip No. 1

French Script Stencil AND Retro Blue Vintage Paint

First Time Use - French Script stencil

Always on the hunt for Queen Anne style furniture I picked this piece up a while ago but never re-furbed it. I must have had a plan! I finally kept a French script stencil for myself and wanted to do a retro but feminine look on this tallboy.

The stencil was tricky on the top, and I had a few mishaps, but nailed it in the end

Tricky to get this on the top, but worth the fiddly work

Retro Blue in Voodoo Molly Vintage paint is my favorite colour, so it had to be painted in this. I used a good quality synthetic flat edge brush, two coats with a quick sand in between coats to keep it a smooth finish. 

No distressing ( unheard of on my pieces) and finished in a light coat of poly. This completes the look, I hope you like it

Poor Sad Before