I have an old side table given to me that previously had a glass top glued to it, which had left a mess of the paint. It was becoming an eyesore, so I decided to refinish it. I wanted to remove the majority of the paint and showcase the natural wood. Here’s how I did it…
First, I brushed on paint stripper to help remove the paint. With a scraper, I scraped the paint from the table as best I could. Some sections took longer than others, but in hindsight, the orbital sander could have saved me time for those stubborn sections of paint.
I used an orbital sander for the next step. 80 grit sand paper for removing the paint, then an angled sandpaper block to get the edges and corners of the table. I followed up with 120 grit sandpaper before cleaning things up.
The top inner section of the table was made out of a type of fiberboard. Since I knew I didn’t want to paint the top of the table, I decided to remove this and replace it with better looking wood.
I found project strips of oak at the hardware store and used a circular saw to cut them to size. I had to create a beveled edge for the sides of these strips so they would fit into the top of the table. This was fairly easy to do with a circular saw. A dremel with a sanding attachment helped me make minor adjustments and get a perfect fit.
The strips of wood were then glued down with wood glue. The glue was messy with seeping through the edges. I should’ve cleaned up the glue better because when I stained the wood, there were a couple of spots where the leftover glue had prevented the stain from working. I then had to carefully scrape the glue, clean, then re-stain the wood. Lesson learned.
Three sides of the table were also constructed with fiberboard, so rather than try to replace these sections, I decided to paint the sides of the table. I was originally looking for a color close to sage green, but decided to go with the Magnolia Green sprayable chalk paint by Magnolia Home.
To each their own, but I prefer to use spray paints in a lot of my applications because of the clean looking finish.
I used painters tape, paper, and leftover cardboard to mask the table for painting. It was important to have clean edges from the painters tape to prevent overspray into other areas. I ended up spraying three coats of paint on each side and waiting approximately one hour between coats. The full cure time for this paint is 24 hours.
The drawer pull turned out nice after I cleaned it. Using water, paper towels, and a small amount of Bar Keepers Friend, the metal cleaned up quite nice. I was able to remove and reinstall it with a pair of needle nose pliers.
For the wood stain, I went with an English Chestnut. I thought this stain might actually be darker than I wanted, but with the green paint, I think it came out as a nice Mid-Century modern style I like.
In total, this project took me about 4 evenings to complete. Stripping the paint and sanding was the longest part of the process.
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