The Table the Table the Table

The Finished Table :Well Almost finished

Well it all started with a picture that I saw in Oprah magazine of an accent table,  it was

The picture I saw that inspired it all

incredible beautiful. I thought I can do that.  So without knowing anything about it, typical for me,  I decided to give it a try.

I thought the piece was painted and I am a painter, I have been one all my life, well maybe since I was three. I tried my luck with a stool.  The result although pretty, wasn’t quite right. But everyone loved the little stool. My blog traffic shot up, I heard from people on facebook that I forgot were on my friends list. Hmmm I might be on to something here. I did some research, the furniture  looked stenciled. I can do that! I found this beautiful stencil from Cutting Edge Stencils by HGTV Designer Kim Myles perfect!

My painted Stool

This particular table I got when my ex-husband spotted it on the side of the road. Honestly when I saw it I almost didn’t take it, I saw  zero potential, but a free table is a free  table. It was painted in a beige paint that had to go. I wanted to do it the beautiful Royal blue that I did on the stool. But… I found this beautiful blue in the reject pile at Home Depot.  Even though the table was large-ish which was slightly intimadating I decided to start it because I could paint it with  no stripping involved, or so I thought, so I started. Mmmmm I don’t know about this blue its looking like baby blue, well it’s still a pretty color. It’s looking really really baby blue, well maybe it’s  having more of a country vibe, its still pretty. Ok now it looks like it belongs in a nursey, not really, but it’s too baby blue, it’s got to go, bye bye hours of work, time to scrap the blue

The table before with kid and cat on it

and guess what? I decided to strip the table so I could stain the natural wood. So much for not striping.  Kim Myles did her table in black and the stencil a warm white. I didn’t want to do black I decided on a dark brown, a beautiful color called Burl from Martha Stewart paints from Home Depot. I stripped I repainted and I stenciled and I stenciled and I stenciled, and I got up in the middle of

The Table in Blue, No too baby blue

the night and stenciled. I stained. I was obsessed, possessed.  The table, the table that was supposed to be done without too much prep took at least 40 hours to finish. I took so long partially because  I am a perfectionist and was retouching constantly. Fora normal person it would be a weekend project .

When I put the mahogany stain on something unexpected happened. It looked exactly like I wanted, it was looking really snazzy, but besides that it reminded me something I had seen before. I am from Barbados in the Caribbean a very small island. As a girl I had visited the great houses of my island with incredible pieces of furniture that were usually roped off and we couldn’t not touch. I had created one of those pieces, something that glowed warm and exotic.

Even as

Starting over with Dark Brown. What did I say no stripping, I lied

I prepared to put the final polyurethane coat and finish. I was fussing  I seeing where I could retouch . I can’t wait to send this off to its new owner. My next projects will be much smaller I need a rest. My favorite part of the piece are the rosettes that I stenciled then stained over. It took a lot of time but it was worth it  -Melissa, till next time.