BUILDING A SMALL SPACE WORKSTATION - gold dipped and turquoise






Do you need a dedicated work place but live in a small space with little extra room? I have built a convertible workstation for exactly that, small space living. I used thrifted items and transformed them into beautiful decor.










 

This is the next project I did for Janome Canada in their 
MAKER's SPACE series. This is a two part "HOW TO",
with this first article showing you how it works and how I 
started by building and painting the base cabinets.
Whether you are a sign painter, jewelry maker, craft junky,
or seamstress having a work table with storage is great. But
 having that same table convert into beautiful decor when you
 are not working or for when company is visiting is a treat we
 can all have. Look at all the storage there is built into this project.


When it is time to set up this workstation the two cabinets
 move away from the wall to create two pedestal bases for the
 work surface to sit on. I made the decorative wall map to be
 the work surface. It simple hangs on the wall with 2 "D" rings. 

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I started with 2 used kitchen cabinets and some scrap lumber
 to build a box on the bottom of each cabinet. The box was to 
make them the right height, create a toe kick for your feet, 
and make a smooth but strong edge for the cabinets to slide
 around on. I used a compound mitre saw to cut my angles 
and a power driver with 3 inch screws to attached the boards 
together and to the cabinet.

 

TIP:
Castors could be used on the bottoms if 
you have a hard surface floor.
With the cabinets now lifted up to the right height I figured 
out where the shelves were needed. Then came a super good 
cleaning with warm soapy water because the next step was to
 paint them.


 

I picked a playful coral color for the interior, a turquoise blue
 for the exterior, and a gold dipped effect on the bottom. The
 coral and blue were mixed colors using Annie Sloan chalk paint.

 

Yellow FROGTAPE worked marvelous for the gold dipped
effect because it was gentle on the newly painted surface but
 stopped any bleeding of the gold paint. The gold dipped
effect is done by taping off the complete bottom of an
item and painting it in gold to simulate the look of the
item having been lifted and dipped directly into gold.




TIPS:
#1. Plastic grocery bags can be used when taping off paint jobs.
#2. When comparing gold spray paint RUST-OLEUM looks most authentic

We don't get newspapers to our house so I had to come up
 with something else for paint projects. I have bought and
 tried other brands of gold spray paint, this is my favorite and
 works the best.


 

After enjoying the sun outside I brought the cabinets in and
started to play with the finished look of the paint. I did the
inset detail on the doors in white using a small artist brush.


 But my style is more vintage and I love aged finishes so I
 went and got the dark wax and 2 pewter
 colored ring pull for the doors.


I have a great video you can watch to see 
how I use dark waxing to achieve this aged look.
Watch for the link at the end.

BEFORE DARK WAX                  AFTER DARK WAX
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For the top of each cabinet I used a rough cut board that was
 the same depth. I cut it into two lengths for each cabinet, 
nailed them on with finishing nails, and used more dark wax
 to stain and finish the surface of them. To see another 
project where I used dark wax directly on raw wood, watch
 for the link at the bottom.


 


And when you're in a small space you learn to take advantage 
of every inch like installing hooks on the inside of the doors
 for easy access to tools.



Tomorrow I will share what discarded item I used to 
build the work surface from and the details of how it was done.

  
I hope this inspires you to create your own work station
to match your style and space.


LINKS:

Full details of the wall map: https://bit.ly/2Imcnkj

Dark waxing over paint: https://bit.ly/2MVR7p4

Dark waxing raw wood: https://bit.ly/2kOkIDH


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Stop into FIRSTFINDS HARDWARE STORE to see
if we have any vintage hardware for your next project.

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