When a friend offered us an “L” shaped desk, I really thought it was going to my husband’s offsite office. Then my 17 year old came along to help move it and he wanted it for his room so that meant the desk in his room needed a new home… this is usually how most of my rearranging at home starts… One thing gets added or subtracted and then several dominos fall as a result.
So B (my 7 year old) exclaimed that she wanted it for her room but it was so big and masculine- I almost said no right away but then thought it was much more practical than her tiny current desk, and who knows- homework may start in 2nd grade, we better be ready!
B and I just happened to be going to Target for a few things and took a chance on looking at their paint department. To my surprise they carried several fun options for us to really girl up the desk! Since her room is a combination of what we used to call “Frozen blue” (tiffany blue), “sparkly hot pink” (mostly just hot pink) and a tan/linen color for her carpet and duvets and knowing we were also going to be “girling-up” her brother’s old bunkbed in the coming months- we had a few options. At first I was disappointed because the pink they had was really pretty but just not hot enough for us, it was more bubblegum. Knowing I didn’t really want to make another trip to home depot this week I was more than a little determined to find a solution at Target. Gotta love my girl- she was all in for sparkly gold with turquoise drawer pulls. I bought three packages of the gold glitter additive for paint and a quart of gold paint, spray paint for the pulls and I had polyurethane at home already.
I didn’t take the time at Target to read that each packet of gold paint was for a whole gallon of paint. That didn’t stop me at all from adding 2 to the gold quart- let’s make it really sparkle!
Because the wood of the desk was pretty close in color to the paint, it only took 2 coats of gold paint, 4 hours apart and then I waited 24 hours before I added my third packet of gold to my polyurethane for even more glittery “glare”. I spray painted the drawer pulls turquoise twice.
I put the desk back together, screwed the drawer pulls back on, lined the drawers with some gold glitter contact paper (it was actually not contact paper brand, it was intended to be used to cover books.) I hope I can find it again at back to school time because I’m thinking now just how cool hard covered books covered in gold glitter would be in her room as an accent.
I hope these photos show just how golden sparkly glittery the finish of the desk is. I’m really happy with it and may consider painting the bunkbed the same. As usual, I love a juxtaposition and to me this very heavy masculine desk with a feminine finish is charming.
Leave a Reply