Nightstand Makeover - Ombré Finish With Blending Technique

Pat Rios
by Pat Rios
9 Materials
$80
6 Hours
Medium
I found this beautiful French Provincial nightstand at the Goodwill Store near my house, and it was in very good shape, except for some ugly scratches on its top. I snapped it up right away.
My color inspiration was the Caribbean sea, and I had all the colors I needed to work on it.
I will tell you all about my process here, but if you'd like to see me in action, watch my five-minute video tutorial and you will see, step-by-step, how I did it.
I started by sanding down the top and light sanding the rest of the piece with a 120 grit sandpaper. Next, I cleaned it well with water and vinegar, then sprayed one coat of clear shellac, which I use as a primer to increase paint adhesion and avoid bleeding.
I applied a base coat of General Finishes Antique white using my paint sprayer.
I got all four colors of chalk paint and poured a little blob of each one on my paper plate. I sprayed water on my brush, then dabbed it on my plate making sure to touch all four colors. Then I started brushing them across the top in a linear motion, letting the colors blend over the surface. I kept my brush wet at all times.
I wanted an ombré finish, so I tried to brush mostly green and teal on the higher areas, with just a few hints of mint and white. I did most of my strokes in one direction. From the top, halfway down to the bottom, because I wanted the lower areas to have less paint. I used a clean brush to work with my light colors, mint, and white. This time I started brushing from the bottom, stopping halfway to the top, in order to get a smooth transition between the dark and the light areas.
To avoid hard streaks of paint, I went over the surface with a clean, wet brush, before the paint was dry. That made some dark colors drip over my light area and to solve that problem, I just went back with a clean, dry brush and removed the excess of water.
When I was happy with the result, I sealed the piece with three coats of General Finishes Top Coat, satin.


I blended two very delicate metallic colors for the pulls. Modern Masters Champagne and Oyster. I sealed them with clear shellac.
 
Here is how it looks now! You can see the detailed tutorial and many more pictures of it on my blog post.
Thanks for reading!
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Pat Rios
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  3 questions
  • Patty Patty on Sep 02, 2018

    Why did you decide to paint in in a linear direction? The colors are beautiful. You did a great job.

  • Char Char on Jul 28, 2022

    You did a beautiful job on this night stand. I understand that to get the flawless ombré blending you left the drawers in while painting and shellacking. However, with that, did the drawers become hard to open (I have an image of window trim painted and once dry the window has to be forced open to break the paint seal.) Or did you do something to keep the drawers from drying shut?

  • GMS GMS on Jul 28, 2022

    I would love to figure out to do this, so you used chalk paint for all and for the blue you wet your brush and painted it and let it drip, am I understanding that correctly?

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