chair | Operation Home

Hey Ya’ll! So, last we left off with No Man’s Land (our spare room), I had just stripped and painted the new craft table. And now, I’m happy to announce that the space has a functional new lay-out. Woo-hoo!

Let’s recap our journey thus far… The room began as a veritable Monica Geller Closet, which I then lovingly dubbed “No Man’s Land”. Because, I mean really. Just LOOK at it….

Didn’t it scream “Enter and never return!!”?? It was wrong. Just so very wrong. Then, one day, I couldn’t take it anymore, so I cleared it out and organized the dickens out of it. Which basically transformed it from the Pit of Dispair to a glorified waiting room due to the hodge-podge of leftover furnishings….

And now, it looks a little something like this….

I replaced the generic, ugly light diffuser-thing on the ceiling fixture with a simple white shade for a more streamlined, custom look. It was an easy switch that involved unscrewing the diffuser and screwing in the shade. Ignore the table beneath the table. My little mid-century gem is there temporarily until I can move it into the garage (some crazy stuff is going down in there right now, so I didn’t want to risk this little guy getting scratched up). I probably should’ve removed him for these shots, but honestly, I’m just now thinking about it.

The table now lends a nice work space for projects… Aaaaahh, function. Such a beautiful, beautiful word. The way the table is situated also allows it to extend easily to accommodate the extra leaves as needed for even more surface space.

To the top of the table, I added a lamp that I already had (would love to change out that shade, though), along with a tray containing books and thrift store sundae glasses filled with sharpies and colored pencils.

In the adjacent corner, I decided to leave the little sitting area that was there before…

I would love to recover that wing-back chair someday. Mac did an amazing job covering it in the brown microsuede fabric when we moved into our first house, but alas, my love affair with brown has ended. I’m craving some color and subtle pattern. Something a little more fresh. The small end table actually came with our coffee table in the living room when we purchased it off Craigslist. I can’t help but think that it would look super awesome painted a bold color. One day I’ll get to it, I’m sure.

And just in case any of ya’ll were wondering what ever happened to my chicken-wire-hacked cabinet (don’t lie, I know this question has haunted your dreams), here she blows…

I simply topped it with a “To Do” board that I made by framing some fabric. I just used dry erase markers on the glass. I added lamp, a few books, a faux plant… and called it a day. I also traded out the previous high-water brown curtains for a white grommeted pair that I already owned. They really add some much needed softness to the room while keeping the space feeling light and bright.

Across the room, I moved my shelf for additional storage…

I would love to paint the walls, switch out the art for something more colorful and inspiring, and make the aforementioned changes to the chair and end table, but honestly, I’m just happy that the room is now a usable space that we aren’t embarrassed to show people. Total plus in our book.

So, as of now, I officially remove the moniker “No Man’s Land” from this space and replace it with “Craft Room”. (sniff!) I thought this day would never come. 🙂

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Ever notice how a coat of crisp, white paint can totally jazz up an item like nobody’s business?? So simple. So basic. But absolutely transformative. That’s exactly how I feel about our bedroom chair right now. A coat of white made all the difference in the room. But, let’s start from the beginning… remember in this post, I showed this corner of our bedroom??

And due to the abundance of conflicting brown tones between the dresser and chair, I posed the question as to whether I should paint the chair or simply spring for a new one? The vast majority of feedback that I received was that I should paint this badboy… But, I just wasn’t ready. After publishing that post, I hemmed and hawed (and otherwise procrastinated) as I continued to shop for The Chair Of My Dreams, just to be sure. I scoured Craigslist, nearby thrift stores, garage sales… But, nada.

My inner battle was that the chair’s finish was pretty as-is. It just didn’t go with the room. And, unfortunately, I didn’t have another place to stash it. So, I questioned whether I should sell the chair to someone who liked it as it was versus change the finish. Ya see, I’m kind of a wood purist… I have trouble painting wood-toned things unless the current finish is unsalvageable or horrendously ugly.

Then, one day, I gave the chair a thorough cleaning and realized that the finish wasn’t as great as previously thought. There were scuffs, splits and missing pieces as shown below (sorry for the blurry pic)…

And this was the deciding factor for me…. The Chair Would Be Painted.

I began by taping off the legs as seen in this Instagram shot (it’s the only pic I have of this step)…

I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with the legs, but I knew that I didn’t want them to be white. Next, I thoroughly wiped down the wicker with this deglosser to rough up the surface and prepare it for primer…

Next came priming. I had to paint the chair inside due to weather, so instead of my usual shellac primer go-to, I chose Kilz Premium primer since it’s low VOC (ie: MUCH less stinky). I started with a small nubby roller since the chair’s weave was pretty flat (and I wanted to see if I could get away with it)…

It covered pretty well, but still left some gaps where the weave intertwined.

There was definite yellow bleed-through with the first coat of primer and after learning the hard way while painting my eight dollar chairs, I knew that a second primer coat was an absolute MUST. That is, unless I wanted my paint to show bleed-through as well. I applied the second coat with a brush to ensure that I covered all the nooks and crannies…

I waited until the primer was fully dry then reinspected for bleed through. I found a few spots like this…

So, those spots got a third coat. At this point, I started to see glimpses of what the final result would look like. The modern lines of the chair were really starting to stand out with the new white color (which *might* have caused me to jump up and down excitedly whilst sing-songing “Why didn’t I do this sooner??”… Always a good sign halfway through a project). 😉

Next, I caulked some of the more obvious holes in the wicker since they pretty much stuck out like sore thumbs after priming…

Once the caulk was dry, I applied 2 coats of Sherwin Williams Proclassic in extra white semi-gloss, which I had leftover from when I painted our foyer cabinets. I used a 2 1/2 inch angled brush as I found this worked best in covering all the grooves in the wicker. I removed the tape, and after a quick evaluation, decided to simply leave the legs their original color.

And here’s the final result…

It’s EXACTLY what I was hoping for. EXACTLY. Crisp, white, glossy, modern-looking. And most importantly, although it shines in its own right, it recedes back visually in the whole scheme of the room to allow Drex and our new artwork to take center stage. It amazes me how every time I walk in our bedroom now, I have a new appreciation (and admiration) for our beautiful mid-century dresser, whereas before it just kind of blended into the sea of brown. Observe…

And a before shot…

And a WAY before shot…

Our master bedroom has come a long way so far, in my opinion! I like how the room has progressively gotten lighter and brighter. It puts me in a good mood every time I walk in there.

On a final note… we’re finally back from our third and final trip (…for the month. So strange.) and things should be getting back to normal soon. This weekend, Lucas and I drove down to Austin to meet Joey since he was already down there for a work training. It was really fun to take Lucas on a trip… and Austin is just awesome anyways. It’s hilly and wooded… you almost forget that you’re in Texas! We hit up some of our favorite restaurants… Trudy’s , Hula Hut, and we were introduced to The Bouldin Creek Cafe which was delish (especially for a gluten-free person like me). We drove around a lot… looking at all the beautiful houses and scenery (I was too spell-bound with all of the gorgeous, full-o’-character homes to actually take pictures of them, unfortunately). In any case, now that we’ve returned, I’ll be getting back to my usual schedule. So, anyways, thanks as usual for stopping by and I hope ya’ll have a great week!! 🙂