White Dresser Makeover

Ally | flop.or.not
by Ally | flop.or.not
5 Materials
$80
4 Days
Advanced

This dresser needed an update! So I turned the lights on ✨ this dresser became so elegant and classic, with some vintage details. Although I had to do this piece TWICE! for reasons you will read below, I still love it.

BEFORE we turned the lights on 💡

First things first, remove hardware

And sand down! I was planning on leaving the legs and pills natural wood, so I added painters tape to them after the sanding was done so the paint would get on the wood.


scuff sanding the rest was all that was needed since I was painting.

Before the hardware spray painted

I sprayed the hardware in varathanes champagne gold. I love this colour because it’s so soft looking.

Prime time

I did two coats of primer on this dresser, using a brand new can of paint.... (and this is where the sad part happens)

I started to paint the off white paint

After I did 3 coats of crinoline by country chic I removed the tape

I than whitewashed the wood poles using 1:1 ratio of water and paint

So I’m my head, I think I’m done. I re attached the handles top coated in varathanes satin coat, and leave it. I had left the appropriate amount of time in between drying ect .....

The next morning I come to stage the dresser and I see there CRACKING in the paint!!!


i literally was going to cry, and I was so confused! I did the same thing I always do.


After a bunch of research and help from a fellow furniture painter, i came to the conclusion that the flaw was in the primer. I hadn’t stirred my primer enough... even tho I did it wasn’t enough. And this is a form of tannin bleed through!! Which sometimes only shows up once you top coat with polyurethane! Ughhhhh I was so mad.

Anyways, I sanded lightly the dresser down again, got all the flaws out, and redid the primer 3 times after stirring the heck out of it. Than I applied 3 coats of behrs off white (I can’t remember the name I’ll look later) because I RAN OUT of my other paint the first time around.


I then prayed and applied the top coat!

And here it is! It ended up exactly what I wanted, just took more time and more product and more learning experiences 🤗❤️

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  • Nan Nan on Feb 14, 2021

    when you went to fix the mistake you said you prayed.

    Did you thank him, it came OUT BEAUTIFUL !


  • Patty Patty on Dec 31, 2021

    Why did you need 3 coats of primer and paint? It seems like a lot. Piece is very pretty.

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  • Dl.5660408 Dl.5660408 on Dec 31, 2021

    Beautiful! One of my favorite whites is Behr’s Swiss Coffee. It’s amazing how many different whites are available 😵‍💫

    • Vicki Vicki on Dec 31, 2023

      Me, too: Behr's Swiss Coffee! Spent a summer studying whites (as an art teacher, so no surprise?) & fell in love w/this one. To my eye, it has no "obvious" brown/gray/or orange in it, which irritates me when looking for an "off-white." It's more like the cream you'd pour into your morning Swiss coffee drink...NO hint of the color of coffee. It's restful, soft, in any light. I've used it on kitchen/dinette/family room walls. It's good w/my late 1980's off-white tile counter- tops---which I've kept through the butcherblock & granite crazes & plan to regrout & keep, even as I prepare to redo oak cabinets (you guessed it: paint uppers Swiss Coffee, & lowers either gun metal blue--if I can find it--- or a rich, darkest green). I grew up in very old homes "back East" that always had painted cabinets. Could not wait for my cheap, builder oak cabinets to get out of date, old and ugly enough for me to paint them without a second thought.

  • Ede Graves Ede Graves on Jan 01, 2024

    It turned out great. The only part I would have done differently is keep the hardware brass. It only takes a few minutes to rub dark hardware with steel wool to bring back the soft brass finish.

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