A Nice Paint Makeover for a Knotty Built-In China Cabinet

by Courtney @ All Things New Again

This built-in china cabinet had so many knots bleeding through its previous paint job, it looked like it had the chicken pox. (It was also a little smurfy with all of that blue and white!) It needed a makeover...

china cabinet built in knotty pine wood, painted furniture, repurposing upcycling

Here is the before shot. My husband painted the china cabinet about 10 years ago with white latex paint over primer. The blue and white matched our dishes and looked great.

However, the knots in the wood became visible through both the primer and the paint:

Before painting, I had to do something to treat the knots or else they would just show through again. Primer wasn’t enough. Instead, I used Zinsser Bulls Eye Shellac. I applied two coats per the instructions on the can, sanding lightly in between.

When it dried, you could still see the knots, but that’s OK. The shellac works its magic after the paint is applied.

I used a yellow latex paint called Manila from Behr for the base coat. About 90% of the knots were covered by the first coat of yellow paint. The second coat took care of the remaining stubborn ones. (I'm sorry, but this is the only photo I have of the yellow---taken by my 2-year-old son playing with my phone!)

Next, I added a wash of a taupe color called Crushed Tea from American Paint Company all-natural clay chalk and mineral paints and sealed with three coats of APC Top Coat. Crushed Tea is a rich color, but it is weird. Sometimes it looks more brown, sometimes more gray depending on the light--even in these pictures.

For more photos and detailed instructions on how I created the finish, please visit our All Things New Again Blog.

We are fixing this house up to put on the market, including renovating the kitchen on a dime. We decided to add the same backsplash tiles from the kitchen for the open area of the china cabinet. We ended up using three squares of the peel-and-stick tile at a cost of about $24. We re-used the cabinet's original knobs.