Vintage Display Cabinet Makeover with Annie Sloan

Oh I do love a makeover. Last week’s Revamp, Restyle Reveal finalé (find it here) was a pretty big one… but today I’m going to concentrate on one of my favourite elements of the room. A mini makeover, which played a big part of the RRR room. My vintage display cabinet makeover.

Earlier this year, we spotted this beautiful vintage display cabinet in one of our favourite second hand stores. With absolutely no need for more furniture and definitely no need for yet another glass cabinet, we decided to buy it. You can never have enough excess furniture, right?

And so, it sat. We had no plan for it and no place for it. There had been no immediate plan to renovate the guest bedroom until RRR got in contact. So, when Annie Sloan got in contact around the same time, a plan was hatched.

I’m a huge fan of Annie Sloan, and her fab products, so any prospect of being involved… I’m there. On this occasion it was to test out the new fine detail brushes.

Vintage Display Cabinet Makeover; The Tools and Products

As a fine artist (I paint ‘artwork’ as well as ‘woodwork’) I love a good paintbrush. There’s nothing worse than a crappy brush that loses it’s shape after the first use. Or worse, before! I’ve dipped many a brush in water, only to find that it had been shaped using some sort of product and instantly ‘splays’ on contact with moisture. These Annie Sloan brushes? They’re ace!! Soft bristles that keep their shape and a good range of sizes for varied levels of detail.

(I should add, although the products were sponsored, I haven’t been asked to write a blog post about them. I’m doing it because I really like them and I actually recommend them!)

Annie Sloan also very kindly supplied the chalk paint. I went for Graphite and Old White, with touches of Provence along the detail.

The most time consuming part of the project was taping off the glass. It makes it so much easier to paint in the long run, as the cleanup would be horrendous otherwise. Masking tape is very much your friend here.

The whole framework got two coats of Graphite, which was allowed to dry before being lightly sanded back on some of the edges and corners. A good coating of Annie Sloan Black Wax deepened and intensified the colour. This was allowed to dry before being buffed to a sheen. All nooks and crannies got a light application of Provence, using a fine detail brush. I then wiped it back lightly with a soft cloth to blend it in and soften the overall effect.

Planning My Muriel

That was for the benefit of any Corrie fans. Mural, to everyone else.

I really love the chinoiserie look and had initially ‘experimented’ with my wardrobe doors in their previous incarnation. Fail. Big fat expensive fail. I hadn’t planned them out properly and it ended up being a half-arsed job.

However, thankfully, we learn from our mistakes and I’m a stubborn bugger who hates failure. I needed to get it right, so this was my chance. On paper, I sketched up a quick composition for the background, ensuring that it evenly balanced out over the back of the cabinet. If you do this on paper first, you’ll spend less time correcting mistakes on the actual cabinet. The more detail you add at the paper stage, the easier it is to paint up.

Vintage Display Cabinet Makeover; Painting the Mural

Before I began, I was sure to mask off my newly painted framework. I then started by painting a base of Old White.

Mixing up 5 shades of grey from my Graphite and Old white Chalk Paint, I varied the shades from a very light grey/white, down to Graphite on it’s own. The plan was to start with the lightest shade in the distance, with the foreground being the darkest area in silhouette.

The sky was the first area to be painted, blending old white with the lightest grey; lighter at the top, blending to the darker towards the horizon. Lighter areas were blended in on the way down. Cloud formations were added with the larger of the detail brushes.

The effect of distance in the land is created by increasing the scale of the trees and darkening each ‘layer’ as you move forward. There are four layers in this scene. Each one in silhouette, so there is no need for shading. WOOP!! Detailed silhouette was also scaled up starting with the smaller brushes, moving to the larger for the foreground.

A coat of clear wax and the Vintage display cabinet makeover is complete!

I absolutely love the end result and fully intend on doing this again on another piece. Maybe the outside? Maybe in colour?? Watch this space…