Another family heirloom...a desk makeover.
As I have mentioned a bazillion times I am all about family heirlooms.
So when my mother offered me “dad’s desk” I didn’t hesitate…even though I have absolutely no use or room for it.
If I remember the story right my dad built this desk when he was 12…he would have been 79 this year…that makes the desk 67 years old…something my dad made when he was a boy….yes, I want it!
Fortunately my son Matt loves family heirlooms as well and since he just moved into a larger home, he has the space and need.
The desk was sporting green. I THINK it is green because at some point I did have it and I painted it green for Matt’s room. When the boys were younger everything in Mitchell’s room was blue and everything in Matt’s was green!
I guess at some point I gave it back to Mom.
Originally the desk would probably have been stained. I remember a time in the 70s when it was red. Then there was the “mauve” phase in the 80s. In other words, I knew there were at LEAST four layers of finish on it!
My original plan was to strip it down to bare wood and stain it.
What is the old saying about “best laid plans….” Yeah…that wasn’t happening.
There was the green…then the mauve…something white I suspect is a primer that was painted over the red…the red was painted over the original finish…whatever that may have been
I used every trick in my arsenal and still could NOT get all the paint off. Industrial stripper, my 1/2 and 1/2 mixture and even sanding.
One thing I will say about both my dad and I…when we do something, we do it to last!
After a few days of stripping and sanding I was able to get all the paint off the top but finally gave up on the rest of it…it wasn’t happening without doing serious damage to the wood itself.
I decided to stain the top and paint the base.
I sanded everything as smoothly as possible, primed it, sanded again, rubbed it down with tack cloth then painted it with a white enamel.
I stained the top with a java stain and sealed it with poly.
It is not exactly what I wanted but Matt and I both love the way it turned out. Right now he is using it as a tv stand in his den.
I was only able to snap a quick picture with my phone but as you can see, it turned out pretty cute.
We are in the process of making some major changes in his new house…new flooring, paint, shelving, etc.
Our plan is to eventually makes some major changes to his kitchen and den and when we do, hopefully I can get some good, staged pictures!
Until then I just wanted to share what one can do with older pieces…and also show that even we “old pros” get stumped occasionally…and when we do, we just drop back and punt!
