The Copper Look

6 Materials
$45
5 Days
Medium

Copper is still very trendy and beautiful. Metallic copper can bring that sparkle and glam to your space, especially for a bedroom or dressing room.

The Stag Minstrel low chest of drawers was the perfect piece of furniture to create that pale colour scheme of blush pink and grey with copper, that is trending up on Pinterest now.

This is a piece of mid-century furniture with beautiful strong modern lines with just the right amount of curves to bring some softness.

I’ve painted the frame in Annie Sloan ‘Paris Grey’ and the front drawers in a pale colour scheme of pink, grey, aqua and white. Please read on to find out how was the process to create this beautiful geometric pattern.

The chest of drawers was dark and not very attractive. The drawers runners were broken and needed fixing, but the frame was very solid and perfect.

I’ve started by giving one coat of Paris Grey on the whole frame and let it dry. Meanwhile, I’ve had to figure out the pattern I would create with the pale colour scheme for the front of the drawers.

Painters tape

Doing some research on Pinterest, I’ve found out the triangle pattern would look good and very contemporary, but I knew it would give me some work to achieve a great result. In order to paint it in a very straight and neat line, I’ve used painters tape (masking tape).

working on the second colour

At this stage, the paint job became a bit slower, because you have to wait for the paint to dry completely before you apply tape on top of the paint to do the neighbouring colour. Also, more then one coat was necessary for each colour. For the pink, grey and green I’ve applied two coats and for the white four coats.

When I finished painting the drawers, I’ve sprayed Rust-oleum metallic copper paint (£9) on the knobs and handles. I’ve had to apply two coats to cover it well.

When the drawers dried then was time to create the lines in copper where each colour meet. From the beginning, I’ve wanted to create these lines in copper to give it a bit of detail to the front and also to match the handles.


But in the end, the lines ended up being very useful to hide the not so perfect paint job. Because even using the painter's tape, the paint always leaks a bit under the tape.


I’ve found on Amazon this Pebeo paint marker in copper (£3) and was perfect for the job.

With a metal ruler with cork underneath, so the ruler will not slide and will not touch the surface you are working on, so won’t smudge the paint, I was able to create perfectly straight lines. This marker dries pretty fast, so you don’t need to wait too long to finish your piece.

Here you can also see close up of the lines and the knobs in copper paint. I think this was just the perfect amount of sparkle to make this chest of drawers very stylish and trendy.

At this stage, before sealing the furniture, I was so excited to see how was going to look like with the handles, that I've started adding them when I’ve noticed a big mistake I’ve made painting the triangles. On the middle drawer on the left side, I’ve painted a set of triangles the wrong way, as you can see from the 1st picture above. The second set of triangles from left to right (grey and white) were wrong. So I had to sand it down and do it again. You can see the correct pattern in the 2nd picture.

To seal the entire furniture I went for lacquer instead of wax, as I usually do when using Annie Sloan chalk paint. I’ve opted for the lacquer (from Annie Sloan as well) because of the hardwearing finishing and durability that gives to the paint. This lacquer also has a matte finishing, so no shining like a varnish, very appropriate for this modern furniture with a contemporary twist. The only shine here is from the copper.

Most of the paint I've already had and didn't need to buy, but if you are going to buy all the materials, you can get one 120ml can of each colour (pink, green, white) which is £5.95 and for the grey 1L can £21.95. I've used Annie Sloan, but you can choose any brand that you prefer. The lacquer is clear matt, also from Annie Sloan and costs £21.95 for a 750ml can. The copper spray paint is from Rust-Oleum and is about £9 and the copper marker is Pebeo and about £3, both bought from Amazon.


A gorgeous set of retro drawers with a contemporary twist.

Resources for this project:
See all materials
Any price and availability information displayed on [relevant Amazon Site(s), as applicable] at the time of purchase will apply to the purchase of this product.
Hometalk may collect a small share of sales from the links on this page.More info
Monica - The Pallet House
Want more details about this and other DIY projects? Check out my blog post!
Go
Frequently asked questions
Have a question about this project?
  1 question
  • Mientjie Du Toit Mientjie Du Toit on Mar 01, 2022

    Hello Monica

    I just love the look. The copper looks awesome. When you sprayed the handles, did you have to do any special cleaning before hand?

    Thx Minky


Comments
Join the conversation
4 of 34 comments
  • Amy26997178 Amy26997178 on Feb 27, 2023

    This is AMAZING! Best dresser I’ve everrrr seen! Love it Love it Love it!! Kudos to uuu!!!💕💕

  • Grace Grace on Mar 05, 2023

    What a wonderful job! Colors go so good together. I am sure it took a lot of time to get the colors in the right order! Best of all, no "distressing" You did a great job!

    • Thank you, yes it took me some time to figure it out the colours position. I even made a mistake that I had to fix, but in the end everything worked out fine. I wanted a contemporary look for this MidCentury drawer, so no distressing which was very appropriate for the style. Thank you.

Next