Pretty in Pink - French Provincial Dresser

Occasionally I'll go to Habitat for Humanity to find furniture. I would say about half the time I get lucky and find something worth taking home and redoing. This cute, little french provincial dresser was one of those worth taking! It's a good, solid wood dresser with dovetailed drawers. It only needed a few repairs. We needed to remove the many layers of paint, add new hardware, and the front right leg needed to be fixed.

The above picture is what the dresser looked liked before we started working on it. Like I mentioned before, it only needed a few repairs, but normally a few repairs will still take us several days to complete.

First, we needed to remove many layers of paint. Citristrip is our go to paint stripper. It's easy to use, smells good, and is environmentally friendly. This video shows us applying Citristrip and leaving it sit for 2 hours. After this video we applied another thick coat of Citristrip and let it sit for 24 hours.

After my husband removed all the paint, and gave the dresser a good sanding we noticed that the right leg looked like it was all chewed up. It didn't have the cute little swirl like the left leg. The below picture shows the good leg on the left and the chewed up leg on the right.

We knew this leg needed to be fixed! The best way I knew how was by creating a mold of the good leg and using that mold to fix the bad one. For more information on how we created a mold and for after pictures please go to my blog post Leg Repair - Creating a Mold.

The dresser was finally ready to be painted! First, I sprayed the dresser with Shellac to help with any bleed through. Next, I sprayed the dresser with General Finishes Stain Blocker. The dresser was going to be painted a light pink. If I were to put the paint directly on the wood I would need several coats. The stain blocker helps me reach my desired color quicker with less coats, and prevents bleed through.

The first moment I saw this dresser I knew I wanted it to be pink! French provincials are so feminine and I always think of them in light, pretty colors. This paint was a custom mix of General Finishes Holiday Red, Antique White, and Snow White Milk Paint. After two coats of the pink and some drying time I then sealed everything with General Finishes High Performance Top Coat in Satin.

Then it was time for new hardware and I also added a liner inside the drawers to give it some extra pretty!