I up-cycle a lot of small furniture. I don't have a truck, just a regular size SUV, so I can only haul smallish-size furniture and most of the time, I am moving it myself so I need to take that into consideration as well. And the smaller pieces are easy to up-cycle and they sell really well! So I wind up with a lot of benches, like this one.
I always begin these projects by removing the top of the bench. They are often held on with four screws on the underside and they come off the base very easily. I also removed all the old fabric and padding.
I had a fabric in mind for this bench. I picked up this Venetian Yellow Milk Paint recently and wanted to try it and I thought it would complement the fabric I had in mind.
When I was applying the first coat of paint, I was starting to panic a bit. This paint was really bright and looking like yellow mustard straight out of the jar. Not at all the color I wanted. Ugh.
Fortunately, after I applied the second coat and let it dry for a day, it looked just like the color on the can and just the color I wanted.
I used 60 grit sandpaper to distress the piece.
I decided to add an aged glaze to give the piece a bit more depth of color. It is very simple to use. You simply brush it on and wipe it off with a soft cloth. It really makes the paint look like it has been on the piece for years.
This is the base with the aged glaze added.
The fabric I had in mind was this gold rooster fabric I had found at Goodwill. And It was only 99 cents so you gotta love that! There was one small issue. I thought I had plenty to reupholster the seat—truth is, I had barely enough. I should have measured it before I started!
People are often under the misnomer that I always know what I am doing and never make errors. Well let me tell you, I screw up about as much as anyone else. Case in point. I typically like to have the amount of fabric that is on the left and right edges when I am upholstering a piece. If you look at the top and bottom, you will see that I barely had enough to wrap around the board. I was able to still fold it under before I stapled it. Whew—managed to get myself out of this pickle!
And the fabric did complement the paint so well! I do wish I had a little more room to work with on the fabric. I probably would have positioned the roosters on the top a little better. Lesson learned for the next one!
How cute is this now? No more drab bench. This one is bright and happy and would be perfect in the corner of a kitchen or maybe on a sunporch as extra seating. It is available for sale at Pipe Creek Mercantile in Peru, Indiana. Update: It sold already!
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Below are some links to products I used in this project. Disclaimer: Junk is My Life is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.
Below is an image to pin to Pinterest if you would like to save this idea!
