my latest dresser makeover

Hello!! It’s been a little bit since shared a dresser makeover and I’m excited to share this one with you!

Here is a before of this dresser, the detail of the drawers really stood out to me and I really hoped that the wood under the stain would be pretty.

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time to sand!

I always start with sanding when I start a new piece. This one was only stained so pretty easy to get to bare wood. I use my orbital sander with 60 grit sandpaper, followed by 120 grit and 220 grit to get the wood smooth and ready for stain. If I’m only painting a piece, then I will use 120 grit- that will rough up the surface a little and give the new paint something to grab too. I’ll use a sanding block or sand paper to get to the hard to reach areas.

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After I had everything sanded down and ready for paint, I decided I was going to stain the wood because the grain was so pretty.

It was super dark and blotchy after I applied the first coat of Special Walnut by Minwax and I knew at that point that I was going to have to paint the top because unfortunately the wood just wasn’t pretty. Also, its hard to tell from the photo, but the top was different wood than the underside of the top so it just looked so weird!

the paint!

On another note, I was doing a HAPPY DANCE over this beautiful shade of blue that I found from Fusion Mineral Paint called Homestead Blue. I previously used Fusion when I painted my Grandma’s Hutch and really love it. It has a top coat built in, that’s awesome because it saves a whole step for me!

lets’s figure out the drawer situation

Well, they were orange after I applied Special Walnut. Not a good look, nor what I was going for at all.

That something else was another coat of darker stain called Jacobean, which is a very dark brown- my cute hubs pronounces it Jack- O- Bean and it cracks me up! Guess what? WAY TO DARK!

So back to sanding, I took the drawers all the way down to bare wood and decided to try bleaching them to cut down a little of the orangey-ness.

can’t leave well enough alone….

The wood was light at that point and very pretty…. I can’t leave well enough alone though. So I tried a white wax over the drawers to give an even lighter appearance .

The wax wasn’t settling into the wood, more kind of sitting on it causing a cloudy appearance. I didn’t like it, so I wiped them all down with mineral spirits to remove any of the wax.

At that point, the drawers were looking pretty good and the painted parts of the dresser were beautiful. I did end up coating the raw wood drawers with a clear furniture wax to protect them.

Every piece that I do is a learning process. No two ever turn out the same, I honestly expecting the top to stain very well like this old piece I did a few years ago.

I hope to follow up later this week with another piece I did recently that is also painted with natural wood drawers. I’ve definitely been loving this combination! Almost forgot, you can read this recent blog post about removing veneer and exposing the cool wood underneath. As always, thanks for reading! xo Laura