China Cabinet to Linen Cabinet Paint Upgrade
1 Material
$45
2 Hours
Easy
One of my most favorite projects that I have ever done for our house is to change a china cabinet that I bought at a consignment shop into a linen cabinet for our upstairs hallway. The only linen storage spot that we have in our house is very small and is located in the master bathroom. I wanted a central location to store tissues, extra towels, soaps, and other necessities that overnight guests could easily get to. The best spot for that was in our upstairs hall, and since it did not have a closet, I had to create something. I heard a designer mention once that a great use for an outdated and unused china cabinet would be to convert it into a linen cabinet, and so, when I saw this cabinet I knew that it and I were up for the challenge.
The china cabinet was a mahogany wood, and I did not want or like the finish. However, before applying any paint, I removed the backing and added bead board instead. The back is in the process of being removed in the above photo. Then I painted it white. The mahogany finish kept bleeding through, so it took several coats of primer and several coats of semi-gloss white paint.
Originally, I painted the interior gold to match a the frame of a mirror that was hanging in another part of the hallway. I really never loved the color, though. For several months I walked past the cabinet and thought to myself that it needed to have a different color on the inside.
Then one morning I just did it. I changed out the gold paint, which was a chalk paint, for a nice blue chalk paint by Annie Sloan called Louis Blue. As soon as I started painting, I knew my color choice this time was perfect.
Now the cabinet looks so much better in the space, and it goes perfectly with the somewhat neutral colors in the rest of our home.
It provides the much needed storage that I wanted, and it does it in a very pretty way. Oh, and in case you are wondering why the interior frets are still the original color, I could not get to them with a paint brush because of the glass. Repurposing this china cabinet into a linen cabinet and then choosing the right color to go with our home was a great idea that I am very pleased with.
Want more details about this and other DIY projects? Check out my blog post!
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