A Tale of Two Tables

I like to work with what I’ve got. It’s a budget-friendly way to make fun updates to our home. And that’s just what I did to two secondhand accent tables!

Now, the first in this “table tale” actually got it’s original makeover almost a year ago, before I started this little site. Lucky for you, I have pictures!

What started as a black framed glass-top table (sad)…

Got a sassy new geometric top thanks to a stencil and spray paint (happy)!

Basically I printed out a geometric pattern that I loved, traced it onto some Martha Stewart stencil film with a permanent marker, used an X-ACTO knife to cut the pattern out of the stencil film (while binge watching HIMYM), and stuck the film to the underside of the glass top so I could paint over the pattern. Make any sense? Maybe these pics will help…

Tip: I find that using an old gift card to smooth down stick-on stencils really helps to ensure that there aren’t any bubbles and the stencil is firmly in place.

I started with a few light, even coats of gray spray paint…

Then I carefully pulled the stencil off (while the gray was still wet) and gave the entire thing a few light coats of white. What resulted was a pretty geometric pattern on the underside of the glass!

I couldn’t decide whether I wanted to paint the frame or not, so I resolved to live with it as-is until I could make my mind up.

Fast forward several months later and I am definitely feeling that the black frame is too harsh for our living room and just doesn’t look right.

In the meantime, I had acquired the little orange accent table. I bought it because the price and shape were right, but I wasn’t feeling the color. I like orange, I just don’t really have a desire for it in my accent tables. Plus this little guy had some scratches and dents… Don’t mind that awkward vase – I have no explanation for it.

With furniture, color is almost never a deal-breaker for me. Most pieces can be sanded and painted or re-stained, and it’s so fun to customize something to my own taste!

The funny thing is, these tables got together by pure chance. I never even considered sticking them next to each other until we put up our Christmas tree. We stuck them by the front door behind the couch to get them out of the way, and that’s when the light bulb went on above the ol’ noggin.

I decided they both wanted to be yellow since we have yellow in other places in the room, and the (formerly) orange table would get a gray top, so it would play well with the gray and white glass top on the other one.

I primed them both with Zinsser B-I-N (my favorite); the black frame with spray and the orange table with liquid.

I’ve mentioned before that I have a weakness for the Lowe’s Color Studio samples, and the paint used for this project was no exception. They were part of the Lowe’s Color Studio Fall / Winter 2013 pallet.

Delightful Moon / Cathedral Stone

I ended up hand-painting both tables. I know what you’re thinking – wouldn’t it be easier to spray the metal frame instead of hand paint it? The answer to your question is absolutely yes it would be easier. But I couldn’t find a spray paint that I could be certain would match the Delightful Moon, which I was swooning over. And I’m a bit OCD about things like that. I needed an exact match. The black frame took three coats of paint and the orange accent table only needed two. No progress pics of the black frame, so imagine me laying on my floor with a foam brush in hand carefully and painstakingly painting the thing, k?

Now before I go further I want to take a minor “non”-stance on something – many people cut their latex paint with a thinner (like Floetrol) or use oil based paint / lacquer to minimize brush strokes. I don’t mind brush strokes on some things, and this table falls into the “some things” category. The brush strokes are barely even noticeable. If it were the focal point of the room I may be singing a different tune… But it isn’t, so I’m not.

Let me go back a bit, the orange top needed a little pizzazz, since it’s geometric counterpart was so fancy, so I opted to use the same textured wallpaper I used on our media stand, my frame in my cubicle and the frames above our bed (which I’m still not in love with). I cut the wallpaper to fit the top before I painted the table, and when the table was primed, I soaked it and stuck it to the top. I waited 24 hours before attempting to paint it, and then this happened:

I must have taken the wallpaper out of the water it was soaking in too early. I can’t seem to find the instructions, so I suppose I threw them away. Fail. But no matter, Mod Podge to the rescue!

I went ahead and painted the base of the table yellow, and then mod podged the wallpaper to the top (I used the gloss finish, because it was what I had on hand and therefore free). It worked perfectly!

Once the mod podge dried, the top got three coats of Cathedral Stone. As with many paint jobs, it was looking a bit funky after the first coat.

But by the third coat it was looking great! I wish the gray translated better in pictures – it reads really lavender here but its very cool bluish gray in person.

The tables fit perfectly between the couch and our front door. I really wish I could put a cute sofa table there, but then the fella and I would be seriously lacking in the walkway department. These were never intended to be long term pieces, but now that they’ve gotten a face-lift, I may change my mind! For now, they’re perfect for us to set mail or our keys on when we walk in the door. How about one last pic before you go? Here is the final before and after: