Homestead House Series: Cranberry

Hey friends! I’m still waiting for the temps here in Virginia to drop below 70’s because fall is wanting to be fashionably late. Not to mention we are also bracing for some of the effects of Hurricane Florence in the next few days and I’m really wanting to just stay home with a good book, some candles and hot coffee. But I do have a ton of work to catch up on including some customs so I’ll just blog about this “Cranberry” Buffet I painted last fall.

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This buffet was actually an old gutted radio. It had a bunch of cool compartments with a flip top where the record player used to sit and a central compartment with two doors that was actually very large. When I picked up this piece it was missing a back and was in rough shape but immediately I could see the makings of a really elegant mini bar.

The prep on this piece was pretty simple, most of which was repairs. I knew I would be using milk paint so I wasn’t too concerned with having a 100% smooth surface. Below is a list of steps and products I used to prep this buffet.

The Prep

• Vacuum with shop vac.
• Wipe down with hot water, Krud Kutter and Scrubby Sponges.
• Fill missing veneer with Elmer’s ProBond Wood Filler.
• Create shelves in cabinets with 3/4 inch plywood.
• Sand leg details with zip sander in 180/220.

I painted the body of this piece in “Cranberry” by Homestead House Milk Paint. This color really is a rich, warm maroon color that is definitely reminiscent of the fall. It can be both an elegant and a rustic color at the same which is why I loved that it brought those two styles together on this piece.

I also did some highlighting with Fusion Black Wax to make sure that those inset trim details were still visible. This piece had so much beauty up front that I didn’t want it to fade into the color too much. The wax just deepened the color slightly and made those mouldings stand out.

You can barely see the interior color peeking through, but its Fusion “Ash” that we painted the interior with. Ash is a charcoal gray color that isn’t quite a deep black but also not distinctly a gray. I guess it is sort of a graphite color, but it looks great paired with Cranberry.

I gave the legs a really good cleaning after their sanding. I wanted to bring back the original stain so I used Watco Danish Oil in Dark Walnut to tone the legs to my liking. I really love the warmth and elegance they bring! After three coats of Danish Oil, I sealed them with spray shellac. Danish Oil on its own has a built in varnish, but doesn’t have much of a gloss, so that’s why I decided to add shellac over it.

The knobs are original, I just painted them with Rustoleum Oil Rubbed Bronze. I always have the color on hand because you never know when you will need to spruce up some hardware!

Well that’s it for this one folks! Hoping that painting with fall colors will be a self-fulfilling prophecy and bring about the pumpkin-ey weather (without the hurricanes) so we can hurry up and get to Christmas! Hope y’all enjoyed this one!