Vanity No More

Leap of Faith
by Leap of Faith
15 Materials
$45
6 Days
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Hey there my friends! Several furniture painters I follow have transformed vintage vanities into side tables. This was something I hoped to do so I kept an eye out for a vanity on my thrift shopping trips. Luckily, my hubby's family did some cleaning at his mom's house and she had not one but two! Today I'm sharing one that I have completed.

After giving the vanity a thorough cleaning and a light sanding, it was time to separate the vanity into two pieces. My hubby used a table saw to cut down the center first to help make more accurate cuts later.

Next, he cut as close as possible to the sides.

There were openings located on the insides which had to be filled. Since they were deep he cut and glued small pieces of wood in them. Then we used Bondo to fill in where needed. I had to apply Bondo a couple more times to get the surface even (sanding in between each application).

Due to lots of scratches on the entire pieces, I filled those in with Bondo also. I sanded each piece after the Bondo dried and reapplied where needed.

Next, I applied two coats of Zinseer Bin Primer to help with possible bleed through. I primed the inside and outside of the drawers also because there were stains and ink marks. Then it was time to choose paint color. I decided to use Dixie Belle Paint in the color Sea Glass. I sealed the paint with Dixie Belle Paint’s clear wax.

We weren’t able to salvage the tops. We used a piece of shelving board I picked up at Lowes. I was able to get both tops from one board.

I gave the boards a light sanding to smooth the edges. Then I applied pre-stain conditioner before applying two coats of stain. After the stain was dry, I applied three coats of Minwax Wipe-On Poly in satin.

I love this color stain by Varathane (BriarSmoke).

To give the drawers a little pizzazz, I painted stripes on the sides. I achieved this by using Frog Painters tape spaced evenly and used my Sea Glass paint. I sealed the inside and outside of the drawers with 2 coats of Minwax Polycrylic in Satin.

I replaced the knobs with white ceramic knobs from Hobby Lobby.

I love the finished results! Next, I have to tackle the matching chest of drawers.

*UPDATE: The matching chest is complete.

Resources for this project:
Dixie Belle Paint's White Lightning Cleaner
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3 of 6 questions
  • Johanne Palange Johanne Palange on Jan 23, 2020

    I wonder is you could save the drawer and use the original top cut to size to make a dresser-top storage drawer? Anyway, nice flip.

  • Janettey Janettey on Jan 31, 2020

    How much all together did that cost in money and for your time?

    Cute tho

  • Susan Lee Sackmary Susan Lee Sackmary on Feb 05, 2020

    If you don't mind my asking, why were you unable to save the tops? TIA!

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4 of 74 comments
  • Kimberly Valentino Kimberly Valentino on Feb 23, 2021

    I am dying over here..this is such a brilliant idea....my god...total transformation and that color is so pretty...

    • Leap of Faith Leap of Faith on Feb 23, 2021

      Thank you so much!❤️ It’s one of my favorite transformations and I love the paint color too.

  • Lillyrose Lillyrose on Mar 03, 2021

    Love the little units. I was wondering if it would make them stand out more if you darkened the lines that are already on the furniture.

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