Wallpapered Armoire

Well welcome back to me !

I’ve taken an extra long holiday this year.  I took time off at Christmas to thoroughly enjoy the season and lots of family time.  BUT… I have been working on something the past couple of weeks.  So to make up for my absence, how about an extra long post?

After repurposing  the previous armoire( seen here  in milk paint)  I came across another almost the same.  This armoire though, was larger and much deeper than the last.   Because I thought this piece would be too large for most kitchens or dining rooms to repurpose it like the last, it was decided to leave it as an armoire.

But I just don’t like mirrored door armoires.

Our before picture shows the Armoire  with one door already off.  I have to say this was in very good condition.  The inside was immaculate. The outside, although also in great condition was very shiny.  We all know how I feel about shiny.

In any case… off came the mirrored doors.

The inside of the mirrored doors had a panel covering the back of the mirror.

I wanted to use this so we saved those panels and took out the mirrors.

I found this paintable, textured wallpaper at Lowes in October and knew instantly this would be perfect for this piece.  This one roll would do for this cabinet.  (I’ve had this cabinet long before October.)

I have to say how impressed I was at how easy this wallpaper was to work with.  It comes pre-pasted and if you follow the directions it goes on without a hitch.

Ok, back to the cabinet.  Since the inside was in perfect condition I didn’t need to paint it or work with it in any way.  All I needed to do was protect it.  We sealed it off with plastic until it was finished with paint. I’ve also learned through experience that painting the inside of anything that will house clothing might smell of paint for a long time!

Remember that preparation is key to a successfully finished project.  Whether you are wallpapering or painting, you need to sand the shine of your piece to ensure proper adhesion.  Follow a good sanding with a wipe down and primer.  The paint color we used is Valspar Porcelain.

And while we’re on the topic of sanding…

I needed sandpaper in a pinch once and went to the closest Dollar Store to get some. While I am a huge advocate for Dollar Store items I have to say, never buy your sandpaper there.  I loaded the paper on my electric sander and within 27 seconds was loading another………..and then another ….

ah, but I digress.

The boards that came off the inside of the cabinet doors where given a good coat of KILZ primer, and then wallpapered.

The dried wallpaper was painted with Valspar’s Porcelain paint.

The papered panels now fit into the painted door frames.

Just because I don’t particularly care for mirrored armoires doesn’t mean an armoire doesn’t need mirrors.  Instead of having the mirrors on the outside, we opted to use them on the inside of the doors.  We laid the mirror on top of the panel and trimmed it off.

The picture below shows the cabinet with grey primer and a bit of  paint on the edges.

and below, each side of the cabinet is wallpapered leaving about an inch border to trim.  The wallpaper is now painted with Valspar Porcelain.

The edges of the wallpaper were trimmed with painted trim and any gaps/nail holes were filled and repainted.

I mixed up my own batch of glaze with clear glazing medium from BEHR and an small sample size of Valspar’s Pine Bark (CI65), an awesome color.

Now here is the tricky part.  Glazing this wallpaper was anything but easy and for this reason there are no actual pictures of me doing it.  I was too busy going from step to step to step to figure out how to get the look I wanted.  Bottom line is, I would add water to the usual glaze mixture.  This glaze needs to be very thin in order to work with it properly on this wallpaper.

Jumping ahead, here it is glazed and dried.   Despite the tough time I had getting it to this stage, I love the end result.

The handles were replaced, not the hinges.

And now because you just cant have an armoire for clothes without mirrors, here on the inside nicely tucked away are the mirrors we saved from the outside of the doors.

You can see how clean the inside of this armoire is.  Just beautiful.

Well there you have it.  An armoire fit for a Queen.

Thanks for stopping by