China cabinet makeover – haligonia.ca

I was in desperate need for drawer space in my little walk-in closet, so I hit my favorite second-hand stores in search of an old, tall and skinny chest of drawers to refinish. But, I wasn’t having much luck finding something that wasn’t too wide or too long for the space.

Finally, this 1950’s (ish), art deco (ish) piece caught my eye. While not at all what I was originally looking for, I fell in love with the curvy shape and determined it would fit in the space. After blowing off many layers of dust, I saw the $50.00 price tag and loved it just a little bit more. So, I stuffed it in the Honda civic hatchback and headed home.

Here are the steps to this makeover project:

1. thorough clean with a damp cloth, wipe dry
2. lightly sand all surfaces
3. another good cleaning to remove all dust from sanding (tip: slightly damp cheese cloth is great for this!)
4. take off all the doors, knobs and shelves
5. prime all surfaces (wait to dry)
6. three coats of paint on all surfaces (wait to dry between all coats)
7. reattach all doors and shelves
8. replace knobs

I chose a bright and fun blue, because I really liked the idea of mixing an old piece of furniture with a new and vibrant color. Here, I also painted the inside back panel a light grey to add some contrast and lighten up the inside of the cabinet.

This 3-day project was done on a shoe-string budget that breaks out like this:

cabinet – a steal at $50
primer – left over from past painting projects, $0
paint – mixed for another project and wasn’t used, $0 (tip: always a good idea to hang on to paint for a while because what was a mistake on one project may have a fantastic use later on!)
new knobs – three used from a value pack of 6, approx $4

Fitting perfectly in my closet, this cabinet offers tons of space to house my socks, tights, underwear, pj’s and other dainties. The bottom of the cabinet stores long and short-sleeved tees, all my yoga wear and a couple of hoodies.

The result is a truly unique and functional storage solution that I am proud of because it’s an unexpected new use for something old (go gorgeously green!)…and because I did it myself for $54 bucks!