Flea market find to bedroom beauty.

Here's an old post but it's one of my faves. We have a local flea market where we live. It's small and hot and dark in a building with no AC and the only electricity is from the rented booths. So far we've only been a few times. I've seen a lot of project pieces but haven't found the right price. Till we came across this mess.

It's a Tennessee cedar chest. SMELLS AMAZING. As you can tell someone painted over it's original varnish  Black on the sides, burnt orange'ish on top. (I'm a UT fan and I love burnt orange this is not that pretty color.) The top had some water damage and the sides looked like someone was practicing hockey shots against it. All..the..way..around. 

The paint was thick coated. But the person who painted it didn't sand first. So lucky for me the varnish under it had bubbled and some of the paint was relatively easy to scrape off with a regular paint scraper. The rest? Not so much. I said this stuff was thick and I wasn't lying. It took 40 and 60 grit sandpaper to get it all off. I did end up finding a lot of the original varnish was in good condition but not salvageable. The entire time I was sanding I found myself screaming Nicole Curtis's words from Rehab Addict saying "Why the hell would someone cover that up?!" the color was beautiful.

This was hours of using the rough grit sandpaper later. Then I used 220 grit for for the finish. I decided to cover the water damaged front side in my favorite brand of chalk paint. And stain the top since it was in better condition. 

Is there any surprise I would use a different stain? I kid I kid. I do love other colors but I wanted dark and I was not disappointed. It took two good coats and a good wipe down to get it the right color I wanted. I finished it with a spray coat of polyurethane.

Here is the finished product. The top came out beautifully and I was able to salvage the sides. The front main panels didn't work out as well so I decided to go with a two tone look. I used Annie Sloan chalk paint in the color Old Ochre to give it more of an antique look. Eventually we plan to add copper details to the top and front. But for now this is how it shall stay.