I’ve up-cycled another vintage army box in Miss Mustard Seed’s Milk Paint colour, Typewriter – a lovely charcoal black for this cute industrial end table on castors!
Flash Back:
Remember this vintage army box that I transformed into a side table last year? (Read about it by clicking on the picture)
My First Army Box Side Table
Army Box #2:
Here’s how my second one started …
I had sanded back the rough chipping original army green paint, then coated with Miss Mustard Seed’s Milk Paint in Typewriter. I only used one coat as the coverage was pretty good and I was going for a sanded, industrial feel for the finish.
Milk Paint even paints on metal quite well. I did’t use any of the bonding agent that you would normally use with milk paint if you wanted to prevent any chipping, as I was happy for some chipping to happen, but as with the randomness of using an all natural paint product, chipping never happened anyway.
Below you can see the one coat of MMSMP Typewriter has started to turn more of a grey colour as it dries. But remember porous paints such as milk paint or chalk paint, need to have a wax or oil to finish off. This is when the nice colour comes back again.
I had some number stencils that I had hand cut for another project, so I re-used these.
Here’s the stencil painted on in a light grey colour.
The army boxes are made from ply, so the worn weathered look of the cracks in the sides lend well to the industrial chic theme.
To add more shabby to the chic, I gave an all over light sand with my nifty Sandi Hands glove (I stock these in my product section), sanding along the edges to show a bit of wearing and ageing. 
I also sanded the numbers, which added to the rustic appeal.
The Magic of Hemp Oil:
Then I wiped over the whole box using MMSMP’s Hemp Oil (also available HERE on my product tab). Here’s an example of half and half – left half oiled, right half not oiled yet:
I added some small industrial looking castors to the base – the smallest I could get to fit on these timber braces along the bottom.
Insides are all painted too, and this one came with a shelf that you can adjust to two different heights.
And voila:
All finished, and for the first time, I get to use our lovely newly renovated outdoor area as a backdrop to showcase my restored pieces!
The whole front actually comes completely off, so it can also be used as a bookshelf for the bedside or a lounge room side table shelf.
I love the castors which make it so easy to move around from space to space.
It’s been so hot in Brisbane the last couple of weeks and when I was taking these shots at almost 6pm in the evening, the ice in my glass was melting at such a rapid rate, you’d have thought it was midday or something.
And here’s my little modeling helper, who had just been trying on makeup with her big sister!