Wednesday, February 23, 2011

{diy draper faq's + bedroom before & after}

First a HUGE thank you for all of your kind words and encouragement on my IKEA Rast project, I am overwhelmed by your response! And a big welcome to all my latest followers, I am so thrilled to have you here.

Today I thought it would be fun to include a little before & after of our bedroom, mostly because before & afters are just so darn satisfying aren't they?? We were lucky enough to be able to take pictures of all of the rooms before we owned the house {the day we had our home inspection done} so the before pics are that much more disastrous :)




What a difference simply cleaning and painting can make! We got rid of the fuzzy blue carpet, added baseboards, wood blinds, and a chandelier. Can you believe there was NO light fixture in this room? Only lamps controlled by the light switch. Oh the 80's.

And as a follow up to the frequently asked questions you had posted on the DIY project, here's some additional info:

Rast Dresser Primer: I forgot to mention that I used Behr's Premium roll-on primer in white to coat the dressers. I'm sure black would have been better but I couldn't find and oil based black primer! Oil was recommended to me as I planned to use a black lacquer spray and this would help to hide the grain on these untreated pieces and give a smooth finish. I did 2 coats and sanded with a furniture grade {220} sandpaper in between each coat.


Stencil: I thought images may help with the questions you had about my stencil:


{There's my curious little fur baby ... always seems to make it in the background of pictures ... he's like the Where's Waldo in all our family photos!}


You can see we kept four gaps in the inlay so that the centre of the stencil would stay attached to the outside. If you didn't leave attachments the middle would fall out. More importantly, this means the centre will always be in the exact same spot!

Headboard: This was a very affordable find through Costco online! Believe it or not this piece came in at $339.99 including shipping.

Paint: The walls were painted Benjamin Moore's Escarpment, one of my favorite warm shades of grey.

Pillows: The lovely pattern fabric is KWID's Imperial Trellis, and a shout out goes to my fabulous friend Laura for sewing them for me :)


A big thanks to Jenny at Little Green Notebook for posting this project and Kate at Centsational Girl for linking to it on FB :) Also, I'd LOVE to do a post and have anyone that tries this at home submit your own version! Please let me know if you do give it a try, I can only imagine all the variations on this project that could result!


 

Sunday, February 20, 2011

{my ikea diy: dorothy draper style!}

If you are following my blog you may have noticed that I am not the biggest 'DIYer' - I wish I was but I am often the type to start a project and not 'quite' finish it, or I have too many ideas in my head that so few of them actually come to fruition. Well this time around I finally put the pedal to the metal and finished a project that I am quite excited to share with you! Here's how I took this plain jane IKEA Rast dresser from drab to fab, in true Dorothy Draper form!

So I started out with a couple of these ....
And turned them into this!




How I got the Dorothy Draper inspired look:

1) I bought 2 Rast dressers from IKEA, and assembled the tables, except for the drawers.

2) I primed the 'body' of the dresser {assembled} and the fronts of the doors and then sprayed them using RustOleum's black lacquer spray {Tip, I would buy the attachment for spray paint cans to make spraying evenly much easier...oh, and wear a mask and spray in a well-ventilated area!}. I did 2 coats to get good coverage.
 
3) I took inspiration pics from Dorothy Draper chests online, and blew them up to be able to draw the shape of the inlay on a piece of transparent paper that I cut to be the same size as each drawer. Here is where the measure-twice-cut-once rule really applies! To be truthful, this is where my Dad's engineering skills came in handy, thanks Dad!  We cut the stencil using an art Xacto knife, leaving gaps so that the centre of the stencil stayed attached to the outside. We secured the stencil onto the drawer using painter's tape.

4) Using Liquidtex's Iridescent Rich Gold heavy body acrylic paint, we carefully painted on the design. I removed the stencil after allowing the paint to dry for about 1 hour. I taped off the gaps that remained (due to the stencil) and filled those in. I let this dry over night and then went over the gold free-hand to make it even thicker afterwards.


5)  I then put the drawers together on the built shelf, and put in some beautiful bronze ring pulls from Lee Valley Tools. Confession: I still have to coat these babies in a glossy varathane to protect them (on the to-do list!).

Source guide:

Ring pulls: Lee Valley (size: 51mm x 43mm- $2.40 x 12)
Side Tables: Ikea Rast Table ($29.99 each)
Black Paint: RustOleum's Black Lacquer spray ($5.99 per can x 4)
Transparent Stencil paper: Opus Arts ($1.80)
Gold Paint: Liquidtex Iridescent Rich Gold - Opus Arts ($6.60)
Xacto knife: Opus Arts ($3.49)


So the total cost for 2 fabulous, Dorothy Draper Espana Bunching-inspired bedside tables ... drum-roll please!!


Just under 125 dollars! Not bad right? Especially since I know I'm not able to afford a real-deal DD piece anytime soon ... some of these well restored fabulous dressers can run you up to $4000 each! And yes, I know that some people have found them in antique stores for  around 20 dollars in the States, but I can't even imagine finding anything like that here in Vancouver! For now, I'll be happy to enjoy my little DD-wannabe dressers :)

Be sure to check out some of the FAQ's about this project + a fun before & after of our master bedroom here!


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