antique trunk redo

I've had this old trunk for years. I MEAN YEARS! I have ALWAYS loved antiques. Knowing that, hubby found this at an antique store the first year we were married and gave it to me for our 1st Christmas. I've used it in many rooms and many ways over the years, but for a number of recent years it has been stored in the attic. Lately, I was inspired to get it down and paint it to be used in our master bedroom.

I had ivory paint left from another project so instead of buying more I added a little taupe colored paint from the little craft paint jars that you can buy at Michaels or JoAnn's (you know what I mean) to my ivory paint till I got the color I wanted. It actually shows up a little "whiter" in this photo than it really is.

What'd you say? Yes, you're right - next I must do something about that blue lining!!

After that coat dried, I brushed a medium stain on the whole trunk - metal, wood and hardware. Meanwhile hubby is standing behind me saying, "Do you know what you're doing?" And I'm saying, "Not really. I'm just having fun with it!" Which, of course, made him feel really confident.....NOT!

Then I took a soft cloth (old t-shirt works well) and wiped it down.

You can see how bright gold the hardware was before...uh...not working for me.

This is how it looked after toning down with stain and a little metallic copper mixed with black and gold paint.

I rubbed some of the paint and stain of the hardware off so that some of the blue from before came through since my goal was not to make it look any newer. I'm excited to say since I used paints that I already had, I didn't spend one new dime on this project.

And here it is in our bedroom. I'm liking it! I might could have stained the oak slats a little darker to match my bed, but, hey, I think it will grow on me and the next project's awaiting me!

I'm sharing this project with Met. Monday, and DIY Day.