Upcycled nest of tables

I love painting furniture and breathing life into a piece that has been let down over the years.

These nest of tables were solid wood and absolutely beautiful.

A few screws were missing and the surface was scratched a little but I was adamant I will give these tables a second chance in life.

As with all furniture, I first clean it with soapy cloth and wipe it dry. I wasn’t entirely sure what I wanted to do with the tables at first.. I thought perhaps to paint them completely and put a decoupage feature on. So I started to work away and dismantled the tables and started sanding the tops.

Once the tops were sanded I noticed that underneath the yucky varnish was gorgeous wood grain.  I straight away decided against painting the tops and instead went with the woodstain to bring out the beautiful wood grain.

I was debating what paint to use and after a short trip to my local stock list of Annie Sloan’s paints I chose the chalk paint in Olive.

So I started painting the legs with Annie Sloan’s chalk paint.  I used two coats on the legs and then waxed.

You can read about how to wax furniture in my previous post when I upcycled an old chair here.  I had also purchased a tin of some dark wax and decided to give it a go.  using dark was is exactly the same as using normal wax, the difference being that the dark wax gives a deeper colour, which worked great in this case together with the stained top.  I then used fine sandpaper and distressed the table legs a little.

I then started staining the tops.  I used an old rag and simply dabbed it in the stain and in cicrular movements massaged it into the wood.

I put on my first coat and the top already looked amazing. I kept staining the tops and put around 3-4 coats on each surface.

You could see the beautiful grain coming through.

When I had finished the stain and painting and the tables were dry, I assembled the parts together and put a coat of wax on the tops to ensure the surface had an extra layer of protection.

This is how the nest of tables turned out in the end.

Sometimes I think less is more!

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