Meet the girls

 

    Mak and Jill have been friends since seventh grade. They both were lucky to have creative mamas who encouraged their artistic sides. 

  They have 45 years experience between the two of them upcycling furniture, creating works of art, styling and interior design. They have a beautiful store "The Abode" - located on Avenida Del Mar in downtown San Clemente, where you can find their upcycled furniture, unique finds, and so much more.

They are stockists of Chalk Paint® decorative paint and offer furniture painting workshops, teaching others what they have learned over a lifetime.

 

 

 

 

 

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Entries in Painted Furniture (3)

Sunday
Oct212012

Bed Turned Bench Twin Sister

 

Here she is!  The quieter, more laid back sister of "Bed Turned Bench".  

 

 

 

There are the twins before:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And here is the first bench, during.  She was given a slatted seat, made out of scrap wood.

 

But her sister was given a solid seat, so she could be hinged, and supply some storage!  Because we can all use more storage, right!?  Right!!

 

She got the shabby chic treatment with some Annie Sloan Old White, some distressing, and a coat of clear wax.  Per Rick, the buyer, who loves some shabby chic!

 

And here they are together.....

So which is your favorite?

 

Sunday
Oct072012

Shabby Shabby's Big Sister

 

A while back I painted a dresser in a shabby chic style, and named her Shabby Shabby.  

 

I wasn't sure I loved Shabby Shabby.  My hubby hubby was the instigator for that piece.  He likes things with a ton of distressing and character.  I like distressed, and I certainly like character.  So I did that piece for him.  And he loved it.  And lots of other people loved it!  Which kinda made me love it.  

 

It got pinned a ton on pinterest - more so than any other piece I've done.  So now I love it even more.

 

So here is Shabby Shabby's big sister.  The better looking sister if you ask me.

 

Again, she is heavily distressed.  But not quite as heavily.  I left more big areas of the white paint in tact on the body.  But I still went pretty crazy with the electric sander.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yum.  Did you notice her beautiful bowed front?  And that nice carved detail under the top drawers?  She is mighty pretty!

And I LOVE the color of her drawers.  I did a custom piece for someone in this color and loved it, so I used up the extra on this.  It's a mix of Annie Sloan's Florence, Napoleonic Blue and Provence.  I dry brushed some plain old Provence on there too, to add the beachy white washed look.

 

I decided to white wash the hardware on her also.  I just brushed on some old white, let it sit a bit, till it was almost dry, then wiped off the high spots with a wet cloth.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And she was finished with a coat of clear wax.  

Incredibly easy, and quite lovely if I do so say myself!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The end!

Wednesday
Aug292012

Bed Turned Into Bench

 

This beautiful bench, made by my talented husband Simon, was a somewhat useless twin head/footboard in a former life!

If you have some old bed frames lying around collecting dust, you may want to pull out the chop saw and get building!  If you don't like using the power tools - I don't - then find yourself a Simon!  

Here is how Mr. Wilson did it.

 

First he found a bed frame on the side of the house collecting dust.  Yes - on the side of the house.  The garage is completely full of more important pieces!  This one was intended for scrap wood.

 

 

Next, you chop it up and stuff.  Really.  I don't know exactly what he did to it.  But I do know that he used almost all of the bed.  The sides are the bed rails.  The front is the footboard, minus some of it - so you could actually sit on it.  And I know he took great care in measuring the seat height before he chopped things up.  Lot's of measuring was going on.

 

 

And then some scrap wood was used to make the seat.  

We debated over whether it should have arms on the sides, and decided not to put them on, as it was made from a twin bed, so it's not very large, and we wanted it to feel more open, and roomy.

 

 

And then I came along with my fabulous Annie Sloan Chalk Paint.  This is a mixture of Florence and Napoleonic Blue.  I painted it, distressed it, and then finished it with a minwax polyurethane/stain in one.  I hadn't tried that finish before, but I imagined this bench living outside, and I wanted it to look antiqued, and I didn't want to spend too much time doing all sorts of layers to get the look I wanted.

I love my Bed Turned Bench. 

This twin bed did have a twin.  There were two!  So keep an eye out for the next one!

 

 

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