The New Vintage

How I Image Transfer

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 21 Jan 2015 19:23:00 +0000

So are you ready to learn how to, as some might put it ever so delicately, graffiti or tattoo… your furniture?

Personally, I think with the right piece of furniture, lettering or images can really enhance rather than “destroy” a furniture. I totally agree that there are times when it is better to restore than to paint over. Unfortunately, those that I think are worth restoring are usually completely and utterly out of my budget range. So I ended up with the scrape furniture that people just wanted to toss out on Craigslist. Which is why I only showcase painted furniture on my blog.

At the request of a reader, I am sharing how I transfer images to furniture. I have experimented with various methods in the past. Some I have heard about but have yet to tried. They all have their pros and cons. You will be the judge of which works best for you.

“Stone Age” technique:

If you want to do image transfer on a pinch and don’t mind the extra, extra, extra work then this one has your name written all over it. The awesome thing about this method is that there is a 99.9% chance you already have all the supplies you need. I used this technique on my “Family Tree nightstands” project.

1. Print the image on paper.

2. Flip the paper over and cover the back of the image with pencil marking. This is a DIY carbon transfer paper.

3. Turn the paper over and start tracing the outline onto the furniture.

4. You will be left with an outline you've just traced previously.

5. Once you've done tracing, color with permanent marker. And there you have it!

“Bronze Age” technique:

This is a slightly improved version of the “Stone Age”. This technique requires gift wrapping tissue paper and a permanent marker. The main area of improvement comes from not having to use elbow grease to create DIY carbon transfer paper. However, if you don’t have tissue paper handy, AND you don’t want to waste your elbow grease like the “Stone Age”, then may I suggest the “Modern Day” technique.

1. Pretty much the same as "Stone Age". You start by printing the image on paper.

2. This is where the tissue paper come in... because of the semi-transparent nature of tissue paper, you can trace the image onto it. And then use a permanent maker to transfer the image from the tissue paper onto the furniture. As you trace with a permanent marker, the ink will bleed though and right onto the furniture.

3. Color the traced image with permanent marker.

Modern Day technique

I have never used this technique myself but I have no doubt it will work. It is basically the same as “Stone Age” except you just buy the carbon transfer paper from a stationary store rather than DIY. The rest is the same. If you don't mind spending a little $ and time visiting a stationary/craft store, then this technique would make the most sense.

Freehand technique

Alternatively… If you a gifted artist, which I am not, you can probably do away with all these gadgets and go right to drawing images directly on the furniture. I only attempted this once and got lucky… The final outcome definitely is not as good as tracing a printed image.

Overhead Projector technique

For a very large image such as a wall mural, you can print the image on a transparency paper and project it using an overhead projector. I have never used this technique but my friend did. She used it to project an image of a tree similar to mine onto a wall. She then traced the outline with a pencil and painted it. The problem is that not everyone owns an overhead projector but maybe you do…

Mod Podge technique

I have used this technique on several projects. There are many versions out there and you can easily find many good tutorials on Google. Here is a quick summary of how I do mine:

1) print a MIRROR image on paper using a laser printer.

2) Cover the image with Mod Podge and attach the paper to where I want the image appear. Smooth out the Mod Podge/furniture contact as much as possible so it will adhere properly.

3) Let it dry over night.

4) Moist the paper (not soak) with water and rub off the paper by hand. Only rub off what you can and let dry. Repeat until all paper residual has been removed. This is critical! If you don't remove the paper bit by bit, or divide and conquer, you will end up removing not just the paper residual but also the image as well.

My main complaint with this is the finish. The Mod Podged image is not flat, therefore, leaving the finished surface bumpy and rough. You could try to coat the entire surface with several layers of Mod Podge to level it like I’ve done with my console table below. Personally, I don’t recommend this unless bumpy/rough surface is not a concern such as the case with most vintage style furniture.

Blender Pen technique

Finally, there is this blender pen technique that I’ve yet to try. I will let you know how it goes once I get the chance to try it.

FYI - this weekend I will be attempting to retrieve a dresser from the garage. I am going to try something new again so keep an eye out for my next blog post.

My Signature Nightstands

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 09 Jan 2015 21:00:00 +0000

Happy New Year! For the last couple of days we had some pretty crazy foggy weather here in the west coast BC but that didn't dampen my spirit a bit.

With the pending hiking trip to the 75km West Coast Trail this summer, 2015 has me looking forward to it. I am so excited!!!

So are you dying to find out what I have been up to?

I got these pair of lovely bedside tables recently through Craigslist. The style reminds me of midcentury but I don't think they are authentically midcentury.

I am quite fond of them so decided to let them shine by simply painting them in my signature Tiffany blue color with some gold accent. And then finished the bedside tables off with some cute saying, "hello there HANDSOME", "GOOD MORNING gorgeous".

One last thing... I always wax my painted furniture for durability. There are many wax products out there but I chose to use hardwood floor wax. I figured if it is durable enough for foot traffic, it's good enough for furniture. So what do you think?

Here's another set of nightstands that I painted last year using the exact same color. The color looks different because the photo was taken with sunset in the background.

To be perfectly honest, I haven't felt much desire to do further furniture makeover. I first got into painting furniture more or less out of necessity. It was much more affordable to furnish my new house with used furniture than new ones. Then I got hooked doing it because of the rewards and satisfaction of turning something ordinary into something unique and appreciated. It brings me so much joy when my painted furniture goes to people who love them for what it is. I also like the fact that I am helping the environment by saving furniture from landfills. I remember I bought a dresser from an owner who was an hour away from sending it to the junk yard. Unfortunately, with the prices of used furniture going up like stock market in my area, I don't think I will be able to keep up with this hobby. I will continue to keep an eye out for the right piece of furniture and share them with you here on my blog. And if you have any inspirations for furniture makeover, I would love to hear them from you. I am always on the lookout for unique idea for my next project =)

Until next time...

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Leftover Flooring Bench

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 19 Dec 2014 19:43:00 +0000

So my husband started his Christmas vacation last week. In that one week alone, I believe he has accomplished more home improvement projects than all the other days combined this year. This of course makes me a very happy wife.

There is one project that I am particularly proud of him. You see few years ago, we purchased some hardwood flooring for the house. After the job was completed, we were left with quite a few hardwood flooring. At the time, he had wanted to upcycle the leftover wood to make a custom bench for the entryway. A few years later we finally have our bench...

To make the bench, we took 18 pieces of the smallest set of hardwood flooring, about 14 x 5 inches. And laid the wood side by side to make a bench long enough to cover one side of the entry way, about 7 feet long. Then using wood screw, my husband secured the hardwood flooring to 3 two-by-four lumbers.

For the bench legs, we decided to go with metal plumbing to give it a trendy industrial look. Our visit at the home depot was a blast. In order to make the legs to a certain height, 17 inches to be exact, we had to play around with various combinations/configurations of pipes, fittings and joints. I would compare building the legs with metal plumbing pipes to playing with LEGO.

A word of caution, although the cost of each piece of plumbing pipe/joint may not seem significant, a dollar here and there do add up very quickly. In fact, the bulk of our cost to build this bench was the metal plumbing legs. The total cost of metal plumbing is close to $80.

While my husband might be done with building the bench, I am not quite done with it yet. Still have to fill in the screw holes. And while I am at it, I might add a few finishing touches myself. If you have seen my other projects, you would know I am quite fond of chalkboard art. Perhaps you have a chalkboard art suggestion for me?

To be continued...

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Deer Head Bench

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 04 Dec 2014 07:57:00 +0000

Once again I found myself blogging another furniture makeover even though I did previously say that I would hold off blogging until next year. It was not my intention to do a furniture makeover so I can blog. But rather, I had such an awesome time with this Christmas project that I have to blog and share the joy.

Some time ago I came across this stunning chalkboard graphics on Pinterest and I knew there was no way I was going to pass off the opportunity to take advantage of it. I particularly like the deer head graphic.

Speaking of deer head, it seems to be making a comeback in home decorating. I was at a local Christmas vintage market last month and there were definitely more vendors selling antlers and the like than I could remember from last year. I almost tempted to get a pair of antlers to hang on the wall… but in the end I think putting a deer head graphic on a piece of furniture suits my style more.

When the idea to use the deer head graphic first came to me, I was not all too keen on experimenting with this bench at first.

I think I was too distracted by the stripes on the fabric to see its true potential. In fact, at one point I have even considered replacing it with a much more rustic looking wood bench.

I’m so glad I snapped out of it and reworked this bench by sending these stripes to the background by white washing the fabric with some homemade chalk paint. Once the stripes are out of my sight, I was able to appreciate the bench.

I thought the bench looked a little lonesome by itself and decided to add a couple of red cushions. As always, my personal touch always finds its way in many things if not everything. And yes, I did paint the angel wings and words on them.

Now I am ready for Christmas unless another inspiration propels me to do another furniture makeover... nah I doubt it.

Awesome Nightstands

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 18 Nov 2014 04:32:00 +0000

Woo Hoo!!! I finally pulled myself together last weekend to work on a pair of long overdue nightstands project. Apart from my usual excuses such as running errands, bossing my kids around, catching up on the latest household chores.., the real reason I procrastinated was because I was clueless. I did not have a clue as to what I should do to these uninspiring pair of vintage nightstands...

Until one day I was browsing at a local Chapters bookstore and came across these adorable mugs. I just fell in love with the saying "Be awesome today". While these three simple words might not look like much, I think when given the right moment, they can be very motivating. And on that fateful day at the bookstore, the design idea for my vintage nightstands was born.

Since I only shop from mistint paints, rather than having to choose from tens and hundreds of colors, my life has been made easy with the few color options that mistint has to offer. I found this dark purple color at Rona and was rather intrigued by it. Decided to name it "midnight purple" and thought I would give it a try on the nightstands. I went with the gold as the accent color. I also dry brushed the gold on a few places, particularly around the corners, to give the nightstands a "fake" distressed look.

And fast forwarding to a few days of sanding, prepping, painting, free hand drawing and lettering later, here are the new vintage nightstands.

And in case you were wondering, it was my 11 years old daughter who helped me come up with the words "Be Awesome Tomorrow" for the other nightstand. What better way to wake up than with the words "Be Awesome Today" and finish off an awesome day with the words "Be Awesome Tomorrow".

With Christmas fast approaching, I'm sorry to say that this might very well be my last blog post for the year 2014. Until next time, happy thanksgiving, Merry Christmas and a happy new year to all who stumble upon my blog.

Updated on Nov 19, 2014: Do the nightstands not vaguely remind you of a box of Purdy's chocolate ;)

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Not So Average Dresser

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 06 Nov 2014 02:00:00 +0000

Warning: this furniture makeover is not for the faint of heart. If you have a heart condition, you might want to think twice before continue reading…

This is perhaps my quirkiest furniture makeover yet. The inspiration all started with the funky green color I discovered in the mistint paint aisle of my all time favorite paint store - Benjamin Moore. Did I ever mention that I make my own chalk paint out of mistints? I must confess that I am addicted to using mistint paints for two great reasons: 1) Environmental friendlier. I am recycling paints that for some reason other people don’t want; 2) Economical – you get the paints for a bargain. It’s a win-win situation for me and the store.

So I bought this paint and I knew right away that wherever this paint is used, the end result will be funky, bold and risky. Sounds like fun eh? It didn’t take me long to decide which piece of furniture in my garage will be my latest experiment.

I decided that since the green is so overpowering, white might be a good pairing color. Initially, I was going to do the drawers all green. But as I was stenciling the subway art one drawer at a time, out of nowhere an idea came to me to reverse the color in the middle drawer. So here it is a green/white funky dresser with Shakespeare inspired subway art.

I know I know.. this is not everyone’s cup of tea so I will not be offended if you dislike my dresser. Personally, I had a lot of fun just letting my creativity went wild. It was very liberating to do something different once in a blue moon. I highly recommend you give it a try. Mind you I would NEVER dare to try this on a high end, exquisite, expensive, antique... (you get what I mean) furniture.

Thanks to a reader who noticed the detailing I did on the inside of the dresser. It might look like wallpaper but actually I used washi tape and sealed it with several coats of Mod Podge. Hope that answer your question.. my "Anonymous" reader =)

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Coastal Style Bench

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 03 Nov 2014 19:09:00 +0000

My house is nowhere near a beach. But since I’ve always adored beach style houses, one day I just decided to bring a little bit of coastal touch to my house with this humble bench.

For me the biggest challenge of this project was the designing. Like a little kid in a candy store, there were so many things I wanted to incorporate into the design. I wanted sand dollar, seahorse, mermaid, crab, starfish, whale… It was hard but eventually I narrowed down my choices to seahorse and starfish. Even though I have a thing for seahorses, in the end I felt that starfish would be the winner from a design perspective.

I quickly went to work by chalk painting the bench in a green/blue color to complement the coastal theme. I used Mod Podge to transfer the image printed from a laser printer onto the bench.

I was really happy with how the starfish image turned out but, though I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, the bench felt incomplete to me… So I decided to google “beach rules” for inspiration and found exactly what was needed for the bench. Now the bench looks complete.

This is one of my favorite projects and I look forward to creating another coastal design. Perhaps, next time I will choose seahorse.

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Mid-century Dining Chairs

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 29 Oct 2014 19:01:00 +0000

October has been a tough month, lots of rain and not enough sunshine here in the West Coast. On top of it all, I had a really frustrating and challenging time with this chair reupholster project. I had reupholstered chairs before so I thought this one would be no difference…

First of all, it took me several hours to unscrew the seats and the backs from the chairs. The screw hole buttons/plugs were permanently glued onto the chairs. So in order to remove the buttons to get to the screws, I had to drill through them.

Next up, removing old musty smelling carpet like fabric... Whoever originally upholstered the chairs meant business because I had a really hard time removing the staples. It took me a day to remove the fabric for just one chair. I am not kidding you but I got blisters on my fingers pulling out what seemed like millions of staples.

I sanded the chairs and stained them in a dark mahogany color. When it comes to reupholstering, the seat part was easy. But the back was an entirely different story. I can only say it brought back memory of sewing my bridesmaid dresses…. Or, in other word, it took a very very very long time for me to get the back right.

What I did to the chair next, you might or might not agree. I white washed the fabric so the originally design has a transparent look to it. Then I painted the blue strips to create a French linen style look. Let me know what you think about this French inspired mid-century dining chair.

One chair down and three more to go…

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Union Jack Step Table

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 21 Oct 2014 23:19:00 +0000

When I first laid my eyes on this vintage style step table, it screamed "Union Jack" at me.

There are definitely no shortages on Union Jack's "how to" tutorials if you google online. But since I am slightly math inclined, I found this website showing the picture below was rather useful.

I started off the Union Jack by painting the entire area white.

A few coats of white paint later, I used painter's tape to expose the area to be painted blue. I've seen many examples where people at this stage would arrange the painter's tape for the blue and red to be painted at the same time. Not a bad idea except my Union Jack design is a bit too small for this method to work. So in the end, I opted for prepping and painting the blue and red separately.

After the blue paint went on, I removed the tape while the paint was still wet to prevent tearing.

Once the blue paint had dried completely, I repeated the same process for the final paint, red, to go on. And once the tape was removed... ta-da.

Don't you agree Union Jack is such a classic design?

PS. I had problems with my painter’s tape bleeding so make sure you get a good quality painter’s tape. Having to go and manually correct the bleeding paint, it ended up costing me so much more time. I guess I should have listened to my husband in the first place and went for the expensive FROGTAPE.

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I Love Word Clouds

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 14 Oct 2014 17:29:00 +0000

This past weekend was the Canadian Thanksgiving. Among the usual things I was thankful for, one in particular was having one of my nightstand makeovers featured on the Graphics Fairy's site. This couldn't come as any greater encouragement for a newbie like myself who has only been blogging for a couple of weeks. Ecstatic is definitely an understatement to describe how excited and thrilled I am.

OK. Back to this blog. I love word clouds. There is something to be said for images composed simply by words or meaningful words turned into arts. It's simplistic and yet so complex. Ever since I discovered how to create my own word clouds, I've been obsessed with incorporating it into things from greeting cards, wall arts to furniture. My favorite go to word cloud generators are Wordle and Tagxedo.

Today I am going to share two things I've made with word clouds.

#1 - Wall Art

As far as design style goes, I am a little bit of cottage, shabby chic, farm house, vintage, contemporary, modern... with the exception of Gothic. As for color scheme, I like every color there is on the rainbow plus glitters and sparkles (seriously I already have glitters and sparkles inspired wall art projects lined up). No doubt I am an interior designer's worst nightmare. What can I say? I love being creative and sticking to a single theme or style would be contrary to my creativity. To be able to design and create my own wall arts is a godsend.

This wall art is created using Wordle. The program is so simple to use, it literally takes 3 steps to create your very own word cloud: 1) click "Create", 2) type, and then 3) click "Go". I printed the word cloud image at Costco on a 24" x 36" print for $15.99. Glue the print onto a canvas and voilà, you have yourself a custom made art piece.

For me the books of the bible strike a chord, so this wall art really appeals to me personally. Armed with this tool, anyone can create and personalize an art piece that really speaks to them. Sky is the limit!

#2 - Console Table
Here is another word cloud project I did. Only this time I've incorporated it into a piece of furniture. I used Tagxedo to create the word cloud. This tool is slightly more complicated to use than Wordle but there are plenty of tutorials such as eduTecherTV to help get you started in no time. My all time favorite feature of Tagxedo is the ability to custom shaped your word clouds. Tagxedo provides a list of shapes you can choose from. For my project, I decided to upload my own image which is a bicycle to go with a quote that has something to do with bicycles.

I chalk painted this console table in off white. Then used Mod Podge to transfer the image onto the table. To finish if off, I added several coats of Mod Podge to seal the image. What a great way to add your personal touch to any ordinary piece of furniture.

PS. Sharing at Inspire Me Please, Miss Mustard Seed, Imparting Grace and Do Tell Tuesday link parties.

The Great Commission

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 09 Oct 2014 01:52:00 +0000

Guess what? I have been commissioned to paint a pair of nightstands for… can I have a drumroll please… my father-in-law. Apparently, my husband had shown my father-in-law the nightstands I painted (see my "From Trash to Treasure" blog) and he was rather impressed. So here I am once again to tackle yet another set of nightstands.

I really wanted to make these nightstands personal and something that my in-laws would cherish. So after we loaded the furniture into the minivan and started the hour long drive home, I began brainstorming for ideas with my husband. Does the best idea come when you are driving or what? Because no sooner than we pulled out of their driveway, we came up with a brilliant concept for the nightstands. We both agreed that my grandchildren crazy in-laws, would be all over a family tree with the names of all their grandchildren.

I had my work cut out for me but luckily they only have five grandchildren so far... First off, I found an image of a tree structure I like on the internet. And added to it the grandchildren names created using various fonts from “PicMonkey”.

Transferring the images to the nightstands was quite labor intensive. My hand was stiff and sore from all that tracing, carbon copying and coloring.

I chose yellow for the nightstands to complement my in-laws' bedroom décor since their house is more of a renaissance style with lots of white and gold colors. In addition to a coat of clear wax for finish, I also added a touch of dark wax to give them an antique look.

I can’t wait for them to unwrap the nightstands at Christmas. Oh, did I not tell you that the nightstands are going to be their Christmas present?

From Trash to Treasure

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 28 Sep 2014 23:39:00 +0000

Many years ago, we had reluctantly inherited a pair of vintage nightstands. I was not a big fan of them since day one. They were dated and a bit of an eye sore to me. In fact, on a few occasions I have seen similar style of furniture left on the sidewalk with a sign that said “FREE” begging anyone to just take them away. If I could find something ANYTHING structurally wrong with the nightstands, I would have been more than happy to part with them. Oh how I loathed these indestructible solid wood furniture which were built to outlive me…

(I never took a "before" picture of my nightstands.

This was the closest one I could find on google)

For weeks I had searched unsuccessfully on craigslist in hope of finding some cheap furniture for my next chalk painting project. Just when I thought I was at the end of my rope, my husband reminded me of the long forgotten nightstands that had been left collecting dust in the basement. “Hmmm…” I thought to myself “That’s gonna be a huge waste of time and paint to tackle these pair…” If I were to have any chance of selling them on craigslist, I would have to take creativity to a whole new level!

I was really unsure about doing chalkboard art on the nightstands. It was definitely risky since I had never seen it done before but I went with my gut anyway. Once finished, I turned them over to craigslist and waited in anticipation. Well… actually, I didn’t have to wait too long. The nightstands were sold in a matter of day! I guess I did alright on this one after all.

P.S. When it was all said and done, there was a part of me that was sad to see the nightstands go…

In the beginning...

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 25 Sep 2014 18:14:00 +0000

Not so long ago, I lived a fast paced life style of working full time in the city of Vancouver and being a mother to my two school age children. Working, keeping the house in order, ensuring my children are thriving and keeping my marriage strong was a challenge. Long story short, we moved to the suburb and I quit my job to become a full time mom. With the new change came a new challenge: more time and less money. The pressure was on for me to be more creative with a smaller budget. And before you know it, I started thrift shopping and turning something used, something old, something vintage into (and I hope you would agree) something beautiful.

When we first moved into our new house, we needed a pair of bedside tables. This was my very first second hand furniture purchase...

And, this was my very first DIY furniture make over. I named it the "His and Hers" nightstands.

I found these images from The Graphics Fairy and applied them on the top of the nightstands using the Mod Podge transfer method.

I had every intention of keeping the nightstands. Unfortunately, they didn't go with my existing bedroom decor. The choice was either to keep the french provincial style nightstands and replace the existing contemporary bedroom set or let them go. I chose the latter. Which led me to my very first craigslist selling experience... And the rest is history.