Refinished MCM Cabinet

Well blow me down Im tired!  Mother's Day has taken it out of me.  And Im not even a mother..  I do have a cat, Ms Do-As-I-Please, but all she gave me for mother's day was a morning armpit sniff and a ferocious bath refusal.  No bacon, no eggs, just a sniff sniff and a whisker tickle.

 

 

 I did spend the afternoon with my mom, sisters, and their kiddies.  I took the two older ones down to the creek to try and catch fish.  And before that I was working on furniture all day (no complaints there!) but Im happy to be flopped on the couch now.



 

 

So I just finished this beauty.  And sometimes wood is just so great that you can't bring yourself to paint over it.  This piece spoke to me...it said...don't paint me. And I listened (for the most part, I did paint the hidden drawer).

 

 

It was in very good condition, but still needed a little spruce up.  I sanded the top and front panels back to the grain and re-stained.

 

 
I finished with 5 coats of satin sheen polyurethane.  The finish is fantastic.
 

 
It has one little drawer, and I did let myself paint that just to add a little bit of contrast when you slide the cupboard open.  I also lined it with vintage material.
 

 

I love the spidery legs. 

 

 
This shot shows how great the top came out.  I custom mixed up the stain using dark walnut and an orangey colour stain I have (can't remember what its called at the moment and Im too lazy to go check quite honestly!).
 

 

 

The shot below is the before, you can see how good the condition was, but up close there were some scratches and dings.  A little photobomber in the foreground there.

 

 



Two tone MCM with a Minny-me

The latest MCM.  I love this piece. Especially with the sliding cross-hatched panel!  I have taken pictures both with and without it, and I prefer the extra interest the piece has with it.  Probably because I have done this look so many times with the dark drawers and white body, so having this little panel is something different, and I like it!

I'm also a big fan of the legs.  They still embody the MCM style, but they have a geometric uniqueness that can be hard to come by.

As far as the transformation goes, I painted the legs and body in off-white.  the drawers were cleaned and spruced up, but they have the original finish because they were in very good condition.  The finish is a dark walnut, it looks a little 'warm' in the pictures.

And here is the minny-me!  If was unfortunate that the set only came as a pair.  I would have loved to have had a matching nightstand.  Minny-me is lonely.  I love the little panel cross-hatched bit on the little nightstand.  It isn't removable or slide-able like it is on the big piece, but it is really classy. 

Below are a few more pictures with the sliding panel on the piece.  There are actually 2 sliding panels, but I think I prefer it with just one of them on.  

Its great when you find a piece that is versatile!  I think this piece could be great in the living room, but still also be awesome in the bedroom with the nightstand working in tandem.

Just another two-toned MCM

And Voila!  Another two-toned mcm.  This piece was awesome, I loved the wood pulls that stick out at both the top and the bottom of each drawer, it doesn't come out well in the pics, but in real life they add some great visual interest.

The piece itself was in really good shape.  There were a few dings and nicks in the top and sides of the unit, so after sanding back, I filled with two coats of wood filler, sanding well after each to smooth things out.  That took care of the problem and she looked good as new!

After cleaning off the sanding dust I primed the entire body of the dresser with 2 coats of GRIPPER.  I only started using this primer recently and I really love it.  It gives fantastic coverage and has awesome adhesion. I didn't sand back to the bare wood on this one, just a good deglossing, so fortunately I didnt need to whip out the Zinsser BIN for bleed through.

The drawer facings were in great condition and they have a wonderful colour that features warm amber/reddish tones, so I just gave them a good clean and left them original.

I considered staining the legs, but opted to paint the out instead to create a sense of airiness under the dresser.   I then painted with my Dulux Diamond in Pearl (2 coats) which I custom tinted to a creamy off-white.

She turned out great and was definitely worth the drive to pick up!

Mid century modern set

Well Im slowly working my way through my stash of mid century pieces and the garage is starting to exhale again as the stress of containing everything alleviates.  Another problem is arising though - Im accumulating a surplus of dresser mirrors again. Doh!

It was love at first sight with this piece, and worth the one hour drive to pick her up.  She belonged to a lady who obviously loved her, because she was in very good condiiton.  The drawer facings and sides were all pretty great, only the top needed some TLC.

I set about sanding off the entire top.  Because there was not a heavy finish on it, it came off pretty well.  One problem I did encounter was I noticed the sandpaper on my orbital kept 'gumming' up very frequently.  Everytime this happened, the sanding slowed down noticeably and I would change to a fresh piece and it would come off effortlessly until it gummed up again.  So there you go, if you find that your finish is not sanding off well, than it could be because your sand paper is gumming on you.

I suspect the 'gummy' stuff was old furnture polish residue.  In the end I gave the entire top (all 78" of it) an overview sand to remove just the layer of gunge.  I then changed out the sandpaper (again) and the finish came off pretty well then.

I custom mixed up some stain to best try and match the rest of the piece.  I used gel stain.  It turned pretty good.  I then finished with a thick coat of Danish Tung Oil finish which really looks wonderful and matches the low sheen look of the rest of the piece.

These drawers are super-duper long, so the were catching a bit against the sides and each other, so I got the orbital out again and planed them a bit.

I cleaned up the rest of the dresser, and used gel stain to dab at some of the smaller blemishes.  I wanted to keep as much of the original finish as I could.

Next up were the nightstands.  Again, underneath a layer of mould, they were in awesome condition (apart from the tops again).

I used some retro material I picked up for $1 a metre at my favorite restore and lined the drawers.

I sanded back the tops only, and refinished them using the same steps as the long dresser.  The sand paper didn't gum up this time though, so I assume it didn't get the lavish furniture polish treatment that the main dresser did.

I really love this set with the long skinny drawers and the low look.  The credenza is only 27" tall. Very streamlined.

This is for sale on my ETSY shop

And yet another two-toned MCM!

Here is the latest in my mcm marathon.  As I mentioned previously, I am working my way through my stash of pieces, next up is a long credenza and matching nightables that are going to get a re-stain.  Too beautiful to paint!

For this little gem, I decided to go for a slightly different look.  The top was in such fantastic condition that I decided to restain, rather than paint the whole outter casing white.

  

This is a little extra work, but fortunately the finish wasn’t super thick and glossy, so it sanded pretty easily.

Only the front facing trim was painted in off-white. Oh and the legs too as I wanted to create a sense of airiness.  The rest of the dresser and drawer facings were re-stained in walnut.

I love this little honeycomb-esq detailing on the top drawers, adds just that little bit of detail and texture to the piece.

 I was a little nervous about how just painting the front trim would turn out (and not the entire casing), but I have to say Im pleasantly surprised.  It adds just that little bit of interest and contrast, yet still retains the charm of the wood.

Beautiful Walnut MCM Credenza

I am going to preface this post by saying I didn't have to do much to this beauty!  When I saw it posted on our local 'craigslist', I knew straight away I wanted it.  Those clean lines, the great finish, the fantastic condition!  Love at first sight.

I picked it up and was even more astounded how great the condition was.  All I needed to do was a few touch ups here and there with walnut gel stain, and then clean it up bit.

It came with a tallboy (also in fantastic condition) and two nightstands.  One night stand was perfect and the other one was not.  So because I wanted to keep them as a pair, I decided to redo them (see their transformation in my next post!).

But for now, enjoy a few shots of mid-century furniture at its finest!

Refinished MCM Danish Credenza

I picked this gorgeous girl up from my favorite re-store.  It was in great condition, apart from the top which was very scratched up.

It was way too lovely to paint.  Initially I thought I might only re-stain the top, but after I did that, the sides and front sliding panels didn't look so great.  So I sanded them back and re-stained them as well.

I ended up leaving the drawers original though, they were in very good condition and I like the little bit of contrast they give to the rest of the unit which is dark walnut.

Lots of aerial shots, the dresser was too long for me to get the whole thing in the shot otherwise. It is about 79" long.

Here is original pic below, as you can see, it was in pretty great shape to begin with!  A lucky little find for me.

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