North and South

I had great ambitions to do one big "Before and After" post. But as I have been compiling things, I think it might lend itself better to several smaller posts. So I thought I'd start with one of the more exciting transformations, like the North/South dresser that I sold in the Spring barn sale.

You all have already seen this somewhat sorry "before" picture:

It was such a beautiful, broken thing.

A friend of mine had kept it for years after buying it at a garage sale, hoping that she would eventually be able to get to it. Sadly for her, the time never presented itself. I just happened to be there one day when she opened her garage; there it was, this beautiful dresser. I almost melted right on the spot when I saw the double bowed front, the pretty cabriolet legs, the lovely glass handles. I could just hear it whispering how magnificent it would be painted a Prussian Blue. She was going to donate it...I took it home.

Once it was here, I noticed a few things. First, the entire bottom drawer base had been water damaged to the point of unusability. I would have to chuck it and build an entirely new bottom for the drawer. The other drawers also had a bit of water damage, but it was minor by comparison. And the whole thing just smelled kind of old and musty. So I got out the bleach, and got to work.

I bleached the drawers twice and set them out in the sun to kill off anything that might even think of remaining in the wood fibers. I even turned the dresser itself upside down, bleached, and sunned the interior just to be safe. Then I reglued the drawer bases to the drawer frames, as they had slipped over time.

By now I was in pretty deep and getting a little nervous. My dad came to the rescue and cut the drawer base for me on a neighbor's scroll saw. He also showed me how to use my Dremel to route the groove so the new board could slide into the drawer base.

As you can see, my dad enjoyed the Dremel. I think he was totally amused by the idea that I had a tool that he didn't own yet.

Anyway, once all the structural stuff was fixed, I could start painting. I opted to prime both the inside and out with a low VOC oil-based primer by Zinnser, just to be on the safe side. It takes a long time to prime and paint the inside of a dresser. I should have taken pictures of it upside-down in my garage. This dresser really did spend an abnormal amount of time upside-down.

It was about here in the process that I figured out what to call this piece. I knew I needed to do something to accentuate all the crusty "used" grit visible around the handles. I knew the piece could come across as deliciously old. (It actually was pretty old.) I already knew I was doing the Prussian Blue and I was leaving the top natural wood. Grey just seemed like a natural base for both. And this being Virginia, the capital of the South, I thought the "North/South Dresser" was historically appropriate. And kinda amusing.

I went on from there to coat the inside and the outside of the dresser and everywhere on the drawers with 2 coats of French Grey chalk paint. It really does take a long time to paint the inside of a dresser. I followed that with a coat of clear wax on all the parts staying grey- the dresser "guts" and the whole drawer, minus the front.

Then came the moment I had been waiting for. I finally got to see that pretty blue that had been singing to me. One coat of Annie Sloan's Aubusson Blue almost made my heart stop.

I think I started hyperventilating when I started sanding:

And it was all over, once I added the dark wax.

And didn't my garden look wonderful this spring?

I cleaned up and restained the top as well.

But all the work was worth it. What a pretty thing!

Here it is all set for the Barn Sale. It lasted 2 hours.

Don't you love it when you can actually recreate the image in your head?

The Siren Song of a Colorful Spring

Spring has come early here this year. March is usually dark and depressing and grey. This year, it's been sunny and flowery and warm. So instead of wishing I was somewhere else while staring at my sky blue kitchen ceiling, (which is how I usually get through March,) I decided to do a little something. I invited my mother to come out and take an art class with me.

It was a class in using color in soft pastel taught by Lou Gagnon of Lynn Vale Farms (Here's their site: http://www.lynnvale.com ) in Gainesville, VA. I met him by chance through his wife, Andrea, who makes the most glorious flower bouquets at the Burke Farmer's market.  They had their own barn sale in December, and you know I am a sucker for a day trip, so Alynne and I went out to check it out. This what greeted us:

Pretty place, right? Well it IS a flower farm. How ugly could it be? (You gotta love hydrangeas. They are always lovely)

Here are a few of Lou's pieces, just to give you a feel for what this guy knows about color:

They are completely luminous in person. I was stunned. Here are a few more:

I wanted to add this last one, just to give you some idea how beautiful these pieces are in context. It nevet hurts to have a fabulous, original barn door as a backdrop.

So back to our class. I went with my mom and my friend Sharon. Lou taught us some really useful stuff about color theory and light theory, about blending with colors instead of just black and white. We even got to wear 3D glassed for an exercise on temperature. It was kind of like being at pastel color boot camp. I loved it! Plus he let us use all his pricey European pastels. Gotta love that.

And I got to see my mom as a fellow student and artist. She's much more concerned with doing it "right" than I am. It was fun to have a chance to tease her just a little bit about being a "front row seat" kind of girl. Sharon and I are definately the back row types. But once she relaxed and got into it, Mom impressed me with her sophisticated color combinations and thoughtful comments. Way to go Mom!

Here we all are in that amazing studio:

The same weekend brought other adventures with it. Originally, my mom had planned on coming out alone, but about 3 days before she left, my dad decided he wanted to come too! It was just what the doctor ordered. (No pun intended, Dad.) I had got myself into a situation that could use a little oversight and he was just the man to do it.

I have been refinishing and repairing this beautiful chest of drawers, but it has quite the laundry list of things that need doing. When I got it, it was really musty and needed to be bleached and aired out. The drawers were creaky and the base panels slid in and out at random. The top had old advesive from a mirror that was no longer with us and needed to be stripped. But the biggest problem was the bottom drawer. There was no bottom panel at all. Here's what it looked like the day I got it home.

Pretty, but daunting, right? I did a bunch of it, but with cutting the replacement piece of wood I was stuck.

So my dad helped out. Fortunately, I know a guy with a scroll saw and had the perfect piece of wood already in my shop. My dad made a template, recut the base of the drawer for me, and then helped me reglue the dovetails to strengthen each drawer base. Horrah for dads who know their way around a workshop!

He also helped me frame "A Shift in the Season", which was huge for me. It was a complicated install with very little margin for error. I got nauseous every time I thought about it. He wasn't even nervous. I suppose being a doctor where you are making decisions that affect whether people live or die might thicken your skin a bit. There really is something to working with someone that has complete and total confidence, both in you and themselves. In any case, it turned out beautifully. I would consider it my master work so far, both the piece and the framing job. (If you are so inclined, here's the entry I wrote about the developement and process of this piece)

Here it is in its new home:

And how could I claim "Daddy's Girl" status, if he didn't take me shopping for a bunch of stuff? I have to say, going thrift shopping with your dad is a blast. He found golf shoes and a putter for himself. I found my entire spring line of stuff to refinish for myself. (I promise before and after pics are coming, but that's another post)

In any case, I owe my dad a huge Thank you!!! You are the best!!!