A nice couple hired us recently to paint a vintage dining room set. Judging from the pictures, it appeared to be in great shape. The finish on it had such a high sheen and was so thick, it almost appeared to be some kind of resin.
The chairs had really nice lines. All ten of them. I didn’t realize the scale of the set until it was off loaded into our garage. It literally took up one entire stall of our garage.
Layering a couple different colors of paint and distressing all the details on ten chairs, two leaves, two pedestals and a very large table can be quite tedious. I’ve painted other dining tables in the past but always by hand and never of the same magnitude.
This time, I had it all figured out. Karen from Redoux Interiors suggested I bust out my sprayer. (isn’t she adorable! I just love Karen!)
We happen to have the exact same spray gun, but I’ve never been able to master the flow of my paint, so it’s been tucked away for a good year now.
Karen is like La Queen of spraying. When she told me the only thing I needed was a smaller needle, I was tickled pink and anxious to try it out. So I ordered one,
and waited…
And Waited…
AND WAITEDWhen it finally arrived I was totally geeked. This was going to be a fairy tale straight out of Walt Disney.
We diluted the paint until we passed the viscosity test and then lined them all up.
It took a little playing around with the adjustments, but before we knew it, we were on our way.
We coated the entire set with our initial coat of CeCe Caldwell’s Virginia Chestnut in one afternoon. Because of weather and a sudden relocation of our store, we had to wait a couple weeks before we could get to the next step. We set up again to paint our top coat of Vintage White and everything was going like a charm until….
We started seeing orange bleed through all over the table and chairs. I was so mortified by what I was seeing that I never even thought to take pictures. It was like something straight out of a nightmare.
We set up our make shift spray booth again and sprayed two coats of BIN Shellac based primer (have I mentioned I hate primer?) After the 2nd coat of primer, MOST of the orange was covered but there were still miscellaneous spots where you could see it. Are you flippin’ kidding me?
Seriously?
I was absolutely sick at this point and consulted with some of the most experienced painters in the business within CeCe Caldwell’s Paints. Clear shellac was recommended so off to the store again…
We gave the set a couple thin coats of this clear coat and let it cure for a few days then gave it two more coats of Vintage White.
I was so thankful that we were finally starting to win the battle, thankful for Karen‘s tips on tips on spraying and for the all natural make up of CeCe Caldwell’s Paints. This paint sprays like a dream and clean up is even better.
By this time, our beautiful autumn sunshine had faded and our skies were filled with thick dark clouds stormy skies of Super storm Sandy. It was sleeting like crazy when we drove out to Lake Michigan. This is SO not what the beach is supposed to look like!
We needed to come up with a larger space for the table top because we still needed to do all the fine sanding, distressing and waxing. We moved the table top into my mom’s nice, neat, clean, “never seen dust” condo
to paint
and sand
and make messes…
Isn’t she the cutest thing, and she’s going to be 77 this year!
She had NO idea what she was getting herself into!
until we hauled this into her dining room.
When I ever so carefully started to distress the edges, I noticed this! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
One more coat of shellac sealed the deal!
Cathy started upholstering the seat cushions with the fabric while I started distressing the table and chairs.
I had initially planned to do the details like this.
but it looked horrible against the fabric so I had to come up with a simple, more elegant way to draw out the details.
I smudged in some Vermont Slate which looked fine in and of itself
but when I put the cushion back on it, it looked totally dorky!
I don’t know… it just wasn’t working ~ no balance so I kept it really simple
Hallelujah! The end was drawing near!!!
We staged the table with a little Christmas whimsy using odds and ends mom had laying around the house to great our clients when they arrived.
Whew! Are you still awake? That was a LONG one!! Have a GREAT weekend!!
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