When 8 different people from different areas of your life all send you the same TikTok furniture flip, you pay attention. This viral TikTok of Pretty Distressed, Christina Muscari flips a dresser to mimic the Anthropologie Enchantment Dresser. Well, turns out we need a dresser for miss Scarlett's nursery and this dresser fits every other nook and cranny I've created in that nursery.
My husband's grandmother passed away in December and the siblings are getting around to cleaning out her house. My mother-in-law was able to grab the dresser that she used when she was a little girl and offered it to us. I asked if she would mind if I gave it a bit of a makeover and showed her the TikTok video and she loved the idea.
A couple amazon orders later and I was ready to roll, just needed a free day off work.
First thing I did was remove the hardware sand down the entire piece with 60 grit sand paper. I thought about using paint stripper but I've only ever done that once before and it was an awful experience, so sanding it was.
After sanding the whole piece I did my white wash for the first time ever. I had read to mix equal parts paint and water, turns out you don't need very much at all to cover a piece. Like, not a red solo cup full, because you won't make even a tiny dent in it.
I used Behr Chalk paint in the color "Farmhouse White" that I had left over from another project.
Once the whole piece was white washed it was time for the fun floral part. I used re-design floral molds In the Garden and Leafy Blossom and Alumilite Casting Resin to make the pieces I wanted. The ten minute setting mixture really did set in 10 minutes. The first batch I made solidified on me while I was pouring it. I had spent too much time mixing it, I was trying to make sure it was well mixed, and it just solidified in front of my eyes. Note to self, work faster. A difficult concept for my perfectionist brain. Prior to the 10 minute mix, I had ordered the wrong stuff that says "24-48 hours".... oops.... I would wake up in the morning, pour some molds, go to work, go to bed, wake up the next morning, remove the molds, pour new ones. That's when I said.. ok enough is enough.. time for that 10 minute goods.
Trying to place all the pieces took the longest time out of the entire project. I wanted them to lay perfectly, so I would lay them down, take a step back, try to figure out where I wanted a change, etc. I used simple wood glue to adhere to the dresser. To make the florals flow, I cut them to go around corners and across drawers. I didn't have sharp or strong enough scissors nearby so I used a hack saw to cut them. Probably overkill but it worked.
My 24 hour florals dried clear, and the 10 minute ones dried white, so I used white paint on the clear molds to make them match the others to have an even canvas.
Then the wax seal. Oh my word this about gave me a heart attack. Behr has three different kinds of finishing wax: clear, white wash, and dark antique. I chose dark antique thinking it would brush a very casual layer over the top.... boy was I wrong. I started in a back bottom corner because.. you know trying it out in an area I could potentially cover it up.
There was no covering that up.
Had to roll with it or restart. It was hard for me to swallow because I loved the white wash as it was so much.
Spoiler alert, there's a happy ending.
Once I started working over the entire area, oh my gosh I fell in love over and over again. I used the Behr rounded bristle brush to apply the wax and had rags on hand for anything extra I could wipe away. The brush worked really well to get into all the details, and nooks, and as I spread it around it made the acrylic floral look like actual carved wood... mind blown.
Very surprisingly, that was the only instance where I doubted this project. Ever since we moved the dresser from that shop into Scarlett's nursery, I just sit in here and stare at it in awe of the new life that has been breathed into it.
I wish I would have thought to record my Mother-In-Law's reaction to seeing it. Her jaw dropped and she made the comment multiple times that she would have never recognized that it was the same dresser. You can watch the entire transformation here on my instagram. Please follow me if you are not already. I would love to show you more creative ideas.
