Distressing Furniture: Case Study on a Desk

This is a bit of a glance back in time, but during the first week of August, my mom found an old desk by the side of the road. Here's the first photo I have of it, after I took the drawers out to scrub it down.

 

And you can't have a desk without a chair, right? So I hunted through the barn to find a wooden chair. I came across this:

Completely covered in bird excrement, but this chair has a history. It is a part of my parent's first set of kitchen chairs, purchased at an auction shortly after they were married. It's a solid little piece of furniture, despite the lack of good looks.

Both the desk and the chair were scrubbed down well with Murphy's oil soap, and then brought inside for a paint job. The entire chair and the sides of the desk got a layer of primer and then a quality white furniture paint. I used a dark stain on the top of the desk, and then my mom put a coat of polyurethane on it while I was in Bolivia.

 

The next step was to simply take a heavy grit of sandpaper (I used 60) along spots on the desk that would typically receive heavy wear. I particularly accentuated the edges on the front of the drawers, and I'm really happy with the way that it turned out.

 I distressed the chair in the same way, and recovered an old pillow with a leftover section of the thrifted sheet that I used to line my curtains and attached some ties to the back for a seat cushion. So maybe the cushion isn't the most aesthetically pleasing, but it works, and it was cheap.

Here's the completed cozy little corner of my room where I do a lot of studying. It doesn't normally look this neat, though, to be honest :)

That was a nice little 20 minute break in my morning of study to blog about this! I'm off to class, then a test this afternoon, with lots of prep for a presentation that I'm giving tomorrow in between.