Old Side Table I Had for Years
I had an old side table in a guest bedroom for 20+ years covered with cloth. I always wanted to do something with it, but never did. One day, I finally decided what to do. My personal design style is rustic glam. Mixing old with some bling and adding my a love of gold leaf.
I don't have any pictures before I sanded the table, but here it is sanded.
I used a fine grit and steel wool.
I hand drew a design and added egg shells. I collected the eggs shells as I was cooking and soaked them in bleach for a few days. I wanted my piece to look old and opted for brown eggs. Once the shells soaked, I peeled off the inner membrane. I ended up with a bowl of shells broken in large pieces. Next, I applied white glue, a larger piece of shell, and with my thumb press down where I wanted them placed to flatten them.
Continuing on.
Help from my cat!
The egg shell is almost complete
Completed Egg Shell and Grout. I mixed white grout with sienna acrylic paint to get the color I wanted.
I applied gold leaf and slightly sanded it. This is the first step towards aging.
I then mixed brown acrylic paint with stale beer to age the leaf further, and then took 00 steel wool (or a slightly damp brown paper bag will work) to rub off more leaf to give the table a worn, traveled through centuries look.
Finally, I used a spray polyurethane to seal it.
Finished project
Finished project
Finished project
Comments
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2 of 7 comments
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It looks great and seems to me that your Kitty Cat really likes it as well. I have never worked with the gold leaf so that kind of threw me but again you did a fabulous job.
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@lydia. Thank you I have more gold leaf items to post
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