My mud room gets wonderful lighting, which stirred up the desire to use that room for working on projects. When we bought our house last year, I thought I would paint and work on projects in our big basement, however I kept finding myself working on things upstairs where there is more sunlight and people. Now I want to use my mud room for this purpose.
I love old cupboards, hutches and stepbacks. I like the idea of using them for storage. I was really excited when I found a reproduction of an old stepback for a great price
They are called stepbacks for the simple reason that the top is set back farther than the bottom piece. I loved the black crackled paint over the red, the old looking wood door latch, and the deep bottom cabinet. What I wasn't so crazy about was the berry red back.
I was less enthused when I set my little collection of yellowware on it.
Regretting the purchase of this cabinet, I told myself to just let it set and get inspired by Pinterest. So I did. I thought of repainting the whole thing, in the yellow color that I used in my mud room, because there were some scuff marks all around the piece.
BUT I truly loved the black chippyness.
Searching Pinterest was helpful, but what really helped me was just looking at my hutch I painted last year. The one thing I loved was the wood background.
That would be my first step, to sand off that berry red background. If I couldn't fix the scuff marks then I would repaint the entire piece. As I sanded, I knew I made the right decision.
I started feeling extremely thankful for the person who painted it red, because it left a great layered look to the piece that wouldn't have been there had they not painted it.
It looked beautiful just natural.
Next, I was thinking about staining it, but I really liked the way the School Master's Desk turned out that I decided to use dark wax instead.
With my wax brush and cheap dollar brush (to get into the corners), I applied the wax. I soon realized I loved using the cheap brush over the wax brush. The wax went on so easily.
Here is a pic so you can see the wood with and without the wax.
Testing the dark wax on the scuff marks, I learned that it hid them well and decided to cover the WHOLE piece with dark wax.
She buffed up nicely
I am super excited at how it turned out, and I love all the room to store our school things!
The other hutch looks great in the mud room and I look forward to organizing my craft supplies in that!
The other hutch looks great in the mud room and I look forward to organizing my craft supplies in that!