Little Piggy, Little Piggy, Let me Come In … a Pretty Pink Cupboard Makeover

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Efex Appliques

I recently received some Efex Appliques to try on some of my furniture makeovers, and I had been wanting to update this Gentleman’s Wardrobe for some time now, so this looked like a good opportunity to try these little corner pieces out. They come like this, as little rubber mouldings, ready to glue on to your wood furniture, and they have a variety of styles and trims that would blow your creative little decorator mind!

My wardrobe, which I picked up at a garage sale many years ago for a grand sum of $20 (I know – they were packing up and really wanted to get rid of this thing), has been home to our kids “dress ups” for years. But since we’ve passed that phase (oh bring back those days!!) and moved on to all things “teen” and young adult, this wardrobe moved to my pile of furniture to revive and sell on.

I gave the whole dresser a super quick sanding with my Sandi Hands Sanding Glove (did I tell you my Aunt invented these? Best thing ever!) Here’s a quick little video I created on the day that I sanded it:

Sanding complete, I added the Efex appliques using the instructions given, then I stained them a darker colour (they can be painted or stained easily) so that they would match the wood of the cupboard. This way if I choose to distress afterwards, I will see a dark stain coming through and not the light, bright rubber.

Uh Oh! We have a bleeder!

I started painting with Fusion’s Concealer (formerly Colour Blocker) which is just an off white version of Fusion paint created using the recycled waste pigments – it’s half the price of the regular Fusion paint, and a great option when painting a lighter colour over a dark wood, which is exactly what I’m doing here.

 

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When I started painting, however, I struck a problem that occurs every now and then when painting old furniture – “bleed through” and resist. See in the pics below, how the paint is beading and speckling in these sections? And I’m not sure if you can see it, but it is also yellowing.

The solution:

About the only solution I’ve found to dealing with bleed through or speckling in this way, is by using Zinsser BIN stain blocker (available at your local paint shop or hardware store). It is a shellac based primer and you can see it is working it’s magic here, covering up the yellowish speckling:
Now that I’ve covered the cupboard in primer, it’s all ready to paint in our Fusion colour, Little Piggy.

Little Piggy & Little Lamb

I finished it with Miss Mustard Seed’s Antiquing wax, and you’ll see a nice surprise inside: the beautiful soft gray, Little Lamb.

The dark antiquing wax settles nicely into the Efex applique creating lovely detailed highlights and shadows.

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In other news …

I’m excited that we now have Miss Mustard Seed’s Look Book Two in stock. Lots of beautiful inspiration featuring the European colours in the Milk Paint range, so grab your copy or just take a look at some of the contents HERE.