Behind the Scenes: A Desk Makeover

Greetings from my new home office!

As you may recall, last week I shared my big Home Office Reveal.  Unable to find the perfect desk from a big box store that met all of my requirements, I turned to Kijiji to find a second hand desk that I could repurpose. As promised, here is a simplified tutorial on my desk makeover.

Step 1: Clean and dismantle your furniture piece.

When buying a used piece of furniture that you plan to paint, clean every square inch with a cleaner or degreaser.  You want your surfaces to be free from dirt and oil. Also when working with a heavy piece such as this desk unit, dismantle it to as many pieces as you can. It will be easier for you to paint and transport into your new space.

Step 2: Sand.

Using my good old hand sander, I prep the entire unit.  Don’t be tempted to skip this step, sanding not only gives the paint something to stick too but it will also help you get that perfect finish.  As a rule of thumb, sand until the sheen is gone. Make sure to remove all the dust before proceeding to the next step.

Step 3: Paint.

Once your furniture is prepped and ready to go, start off with some primer.  In this case, I painted the desk white and to avoid buying multiple cans of paint, I stuck to a primer and paint in one. However, if you are using any colour besides white always use a good primer first.  Colour shows best on a blank white canvas!

I painted two coats using the colour, Simply White from Benjamin Moore.  I always give a light sanding in between coats.  It will help your furniture from chipping in the future.

Step 4: Add accent colour.

I chose to paint the decorative trim on my cabinets.  I did this free hand; however, if you’re not handy with the paint brush, I recommend using painters tape and taping as much as you can to avoid going out of the lines.

Helpful Hint –  When shopping for small amounts of paint (like accent colours) ask the paint store to see their selection of mismatch paint colours.  These are cans of paint that were either not mixed right or called-in and never picked up and they are usually very inexpensive to purchase.  Always worth the look!

Step 5: Prepare desktop.

Next I got rid of the laminate desktop and replaced it with a pine wood top that I purchased from my local hardware store.  I wanted to add an extension so I bought two pieces at 6ft long.

Since pine wood is a little more finicky when it comes to staining, I treated the pine with wood conditioner first.  I used MinWax Wood Conditioner and applied two coats.  This penetrates into the wood acting as an outer layer to help the stain go on smoothly.

After it was fully dried, I applied the MinWax Wood Stain in this aqua blue colour.  I know…very risky!!

Overall, the colour was a little stronger than I anticipated but it eventually grew on me.  Last but not least, to seal everything in and protect the wood, I opted for a varathane protector.

Step 6: Create legs for desk extension.

Thanks to Big Joe, he created these wonderful wooden legs to hold up my new desk extension.

With a little help, this unit was assembled all together and secured into place. All done! whew.