Remaking-over a Mid-Century Dresser

7 Materials
$20
3 Days
Easy
A garage sale find returned closer to its former glory.
Many many moons ago, my mom picked me up this dresser from a garage sale super cheap. It was not in great condition at the time so I painted it purple and yellow. It made sense, you have to trust me.
The dresser got chewed on by my puppy Hailey, I moved several times, and somewhere in between it got coated in a pale tan color and black.


I know, you're probably freaking out, "don't ever paint furniture!" "Why would you ever do that?!" Like I said, it must've been in poor shape.


Over the last few years though, I have been wanting to strip the paint, curious see what I had covered all this time.
That time arrived. Which is great because I loooove stripping paint. I know, I have a weird affliction.
Be sure to follow the directions on your container and wear safety gear. Here I slathered on the stripper with a chip brush in a thick goopy fashion and I am (im)patiently waiting to strip it off.


Using a plastic putty knife, I scraped the paint off slowly, wiped the goo onto newspaper, occasionally used a plastic scrub brush with fresh stripper, then wiped it clean with a rag.
It may take several attempts to get all the paint off. Once it's stripped to satisfaction, I then use a wet with water rag to wash off the stripper.
Here's the drawer face completely stripped. Turns out the dresser wasn't in too terrible shape after all. Huh. It was probably the top that was the worst off.


The yellow paint I had used stained the handles so I had to rethink my refinishing plan.
I decided to paint the handles white. All I did on the darker drawer here was coat on some Restor-a-Finish in neutral.
Next was stripping the sides of the furniture case which I did by dragging the thing down to the hall bathroom. I know, not ideal.
As a seal coat, I used Howard Feed-n-Wax. Yes, a lot of products with a lot of dashes.


After touching up the black paint on the top, the edges, and legs because I have a thing for black paint, it was complete!
I think it came out pretty sharp.
So kinda its former glory, kinda updated but generally all around much better than it was.


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Becky at Flipping the Flip
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  • Vic24894731 Vic24894731 on Nov 07, 2018

    Looks really nice. I have a very similar dresser that my parents bought when they got married in 1962. I just refinished it for my son. It had a formica top. Does yours and what did you do with it? None of your pics show the top. Oh, and these dressers are super sturdy. I love how mine has held up and I can see yours is in good condition structurally too.

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