Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Table makeover


Well I'll start off with a little history. Hubster and I bought this table from the local classifieds about 8 years ago when we bought our house. I fell in love with it. I loved the color, the design, the everything. When we bought it, I knew it would need to be refinished eventually. But I had no idea how to recreate this fabulous 1950's blonde look. So one day while eating at the local mexican restaurant I fell in love with their chairs. It was the inspiration I needed to tackle this project. I got to work right away stripping the chairs first.
Little did I know that this wood was actually MAHOGANY! I was certain the old lady who purchased this Drexel set back in the day was rolling over in her grave when I was applying the turquoise stain! It was a long lengthy process. Because it was red mahogany, I couldn't simply apply my stain. Thankfully, my BFF- Google, helped me find out that you bleach mahogany in order to get it lighter. So after many phone calls I found someone who actually stocked the special wood bleach and away I went.
6 weeks later, the set is complete. I couldn't be happier with them. They were 100% worth all the work and frustration I put into these. And I do mean I. Hubster helped me get the table out the garage and I did the rest.
I learned a lot about furniture refinishing during this process. It was a lot of fun to re-route my creativity to a new direction!