I spent some more time today on the empire buffet. If you missed what this piece looked like before and how it got to this stage, check out PART ONE.
So, we last left the piece with the top stripped off the finish and the body painted in one coat of Shutter Gray MMS Milk Paint with the bonding agent added in. Since milk paint is thinner than most modern paints, the coverage can be streaky in the first coat if the paint color your using is drastically different than the surface you’re painting. In this case, I was painting a really dark wood with a medium gray paint, so it wasn’t going to cover in one coat.
This is the stage where some people lose heart…
As with most multi-step furniture painting projects, it looks worse before it looks better. I’ve said it many times; do not give up at the ugly stage.
See how much better it looks with just a second coat of paint?
This piece had the “dreaded red stain” that seeps pink through the paint. Ugh. Fortunately, the finish was mostly intact, sealing the pink in, but it bled through in a few places. Once the milk paint was dry, I brushed on a little bit of Tough Coat (our new finish that will be available soon) over those areas…
I let the Tough Coat dry and then applied a little more Shutter Gray. The Tough Coat sealed the stain, so there isn’t any pink showing through.
Once everything was dry, I took the piece outside and sanded down the top. I had stripped it already, but the reddish/pinkish stain remained and I really wanted a light and airy look for this piece.
When sanding a top down, I start with a really rough paper like 40 grit, then move up in steps…100, 180, 220, 320. The higher the number, the finer the grit and the smoother the wood will be. The lighter top was working so much better with the pale blue/gray paint now.
But I wanted to go even lighter, so I rubbed in some White Wax.
It gave the wood a beautiful, bleached look, which was just what I wanted. The key when doing this technique is to work on raw wood, to really work it into the grain…
…and then to wipe away the excess, revealing the grain.
As with our other waxes, the finish shouldn’t feel sticky or tacky after it’s applied. Really work it in and rub it away, so it feels smooth and only slightly wet to the touch.
I decided to do some decorative painting on this piece, so I chalked out a simple, sort of Scandinavian, design and painted it with white acrylic paint. Once that was dry, I wanted to soften the look, so I used White Wax on the body of the piece.
I just wanted a soft, faded look, so I only loaded a little on our medium wax brush. It brushes on heavy at first…
…but I really worked it over the surface until the look was muted and soft.
In the picture below, the top and right of the piece has been White Waxed and the left is unwaxed, so you can see the difference. It’s just a very subtle difference that blends in the hand painted detail and makes the paint almost look faded.
Waxing the piece also “erases” any chalk lines that remain.
Here’s a peek at how the piece is turning out…
I hope to finish it tomorrow…
