Old Lady Dresser to Rustic Boy Dresser

Right before we moved, our neighbor put a dresser out on the curb with a "Free" sign.  By now, I've learned to not judge a furniture's outward appearance, but to judge a piece based on it's bones and potential. Even though I really did not want to acquire anything additional to move with us, I did hate one of the dressers my boys had, and had to at least look. What I found was what looked like an old lady's dresser, but there were solid wood dovetail drawers, and a sturdy, solid structure. Everything was in good shape, except the outside appearance, so I had to have it. Once again the power of paint and hardware came to the rescue. 

Today I don't plan on writing a long, complicated tutorial, but hope to just give some outdated pieces a second chance.

Here is what the dresser looked like Before:

 Things I Didn't Like:

1. Orange wood
2. Gold flower hardware
3. Decorative wood piece under the top drawers
4. Flowers painted on top drawers

 Things I Did Like:

1. Solid wood dresser
2. Dovetail drawers that were in good shape (sturdy, slid well, nothing broken)
3. Number of drawers
4. Dresser was upright, uses less floor space

Simple How-To

1. Remove hardware
2. Pry off decorative wood piece & nailed on another, simpler wood piece
3. Lightly sand all surfaces with 220 grit sandpaper
4. Clean all surfaces from dust and grime
5. For outside perimeter I re-stained the wood so I had to sand these surfaces down to bare wood
6. Hand painted front of dresser (decided to forego my paint sprayer since I didn't have a lot of paint in the color I wanted to use, and that saved me time from taping off everything so it didn't get sprayed)
7. Stained rest of dresser (used steel wool in between coats and used General Finishes Gel Topcoat on top)
8. Put on new knobs and pulls that I purchased at Hobby Lobby when they were 50% off

Color of the paint is not accurate, but wanted to show the cute, rustic pulls close-up

The varnish was hard to get off, and I had attempted to do so with Citristrip (which just made a stickier mess). I wish I had just taken my sander to it originally, so it didn't end up so patchy looking, and wasn't such a messy ordeal

I did like how the new stain "cooled down" the look of the dresser, and had a rustic finish to it

It was the last furniture project I have done for a long time, and feel the itch to do another rising within me. Their bedroom has a lot of improving to do, (new paint for walls, different wall decor, etc.), but it works, and my 3 and 5 year old boys don't seem to notice ;).

Here's to the transformative power of paint and hardware!!