Tutorial on How to Paint an Antique Cupboard with Chalk Paint

Today's post will teach you how to use chalk paint to transform an antique cupboard.  So easy, so peasy, you will wonder why you never tried this before.... ahem, but then again, maybe not.

Let us start with where to buy chalk paint.  You can be the trendy girl who spends too much because you know, EVERYONE uses Annie Sloan chalk paints.  Annie Sloan is to chalk paint as Louis Vuitton is to handbags, or so I am told.  It is crazy expensive and I am a tightwad, so I tried the bargain basement brands and they have worked very well.  On this cupboard, I used Decoart brand paint from Hobby Lobby, I have also tried the paint they sell at Menards and a home made version someone at an antique shop mixed up, they all worked great.

Next let us get real about how easy this is.  It is better than sanding and stripping off old finish before painting, but there is still a lot of work involved, so prepare yourself to be tired and dirty and know that you will need days to finish.

Here is my cupboard:

It is an antique seed cupboard from a general store, originally had wheat and corn and beans and other dried brown crap in the glass front drawers.  The varnish looks terrible, the drawers are all cracked and the entire cupboard is filthy.  It is wash-6-times-and-still-have-dirt-on-it-filthy.  This had to be remedied before I started painting.  So, one whole afternoon just washing the darn thing.

Now here is the good part, you can just start painting now.  You really do not need to remove finish or sand before you begin.

So, now I have spent quite some time putting on the first coat.  It still looks like crap.  Don't get panicky, Ethel.  (I Love Lucy in Off to Florida).  We still have two coats of paint to go.  I painted two coats, let dry overnight, sanded lightly and cleaned off the dust before putting on the third and final coat.  Sometimes the color of the old finish will bleed through the paint.  If that happens, put a coat of sealer on after the second coat of paint, then paint over the sealer for the third coat.  When the third coat is dry, sand the edges for a worn look.  I think you have to do this, if you leave it just painted it really doesn't look good.  Sanding the edges gives it a nice antique cottagey look that is beautiful.  One more cleaning, then time to seal.  I used Minwax Polycrylic in satin finish.  Are you ready to see the end product?

TA DA!  I put on new handles from the House of Antique Hardware and used dried white beans and split peas in the drawer fronts.  Coincidentally, this is the introduction to "Welcome to My Kitchen Remodel".  Oh, it has been a mess, but we will talk about that next time.

Do You Need to Use the Facilities?

Here I show you the "quick" project in the house, the little powder room off the kitchen.  It was in pretty good shape, and was mostly cosmetic fixes.  My husband put in a new faucet and had to lie inside the tiny vanity to do the plumbing--that was when you would have heard bad words echoing through the house.  He also replaced the toilet with the Titan super flusher from Menards.  When we bought it, the clerk helping us load it into the car told us "You folks are really going to enjoy this."  Indeed we have.

Here we are in the time machine to look at the bathroom before, plain white with a very strange shell light cover which hung with a wire over a bare utility bulb.  This light is one of the many WTF? things that were in the house, especially the recently "remodeled" rooms.

It also smelled like mold, thus the Christmas soaps on the sink I was using to drown out the scent before we could fix it.

Back to the future, we are now beachy blue green.

I chose a nautical theme for this room, as you do.

This antique brass gaslight converted to electricity makes a big difference from sad shell light. The mirror is ship portal looking, because Why not?

Oh, and the mold smell is long gone, hoorah!

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Shall We Have a Peek Inside the Cupboards?

I have always loved blue and white, and have been purchasing bits of chipped china and old cracked crocks and just anything pretty for years in my role as Antique Dealer (note the capitals, it is my job title).   It turns out, I seem to be the only person in Iowa who likes odd pieces of blue china and cracked crocks, and I end up never being able to sell it.  Well, at last I have a place to put it.  The built-in cupboards in the living room are a dream come true for me.  It took hours of arranging and rearranging, but now I just sit and gaze at the cupboards when I need a break from the dust clouds of remodeling that still puff around me, it makes me happy.

just next to the cupboards is my antique garden statue, too pretty to let sit out in the rain and snow

Step In To The Great Room

I do refer to this room as my living room, but I just looked back at the old realtor's brochure when we bought the house and they called it the great room--fancy, schmancy.  They did that a lot in the brochure, such good marketers.

Restoring the living room was going to be a snap after the nightmare of removing dusty grass cloth from the music room.  Yes, I truly believed that.  After all, it only needed a new coat of paint.  Three months of working every day is what that "new coat of paint" took.  First, there were cracks in the wall--funny how we just didn't see them until we started the painting.  James got out the plaster and spent days fixing cracks and caulking the woodwork seams.  I cleaned up the dust mess and got out the paint.  All that gorgeous woodwork took two coats of paint and a coat of sealer at the end.  I thought I would NEVER finish.  At last I did, and very pretty it is.  Observe the before and afters:

This is when the former owners lived there, they liked modern stuff mixed with traditional.

Now, this is an Elaine room!  My husband replaced the tile around the fireplace and put in all new outlets, I painted and painted and painted...  Most favorite thing?  The blue ceiling, of course.  This is just half the room, turn around, we will look at the other side.

Once again, we have travelled back in time to the before.  The weird bird thing I just have no words for.

Here we are back in the present in my world.  I just love this room so much.  The minute I walked into it one year ago, I fell in love with the house, but truly thought there was not once chance in hell that I would ever actually own it, but everything just fell into place and I do!

Here is one more view of the room.  I've been collecting old oil paintings for years.  I used to be able to find them every where in antique shops and they were never very expensive.  I am so glad I took advantage at the time, they are much scarcer these days.