Customizing IKEA furniture: A Sweet Chic Dresser for Our Baby Girl

Custom Ikea Dresser redo by Happy Chapter

When Mark and I found out we were having a baby girl, we couldn’t have been more excited! As soon as we found out, the nursery ideas began a-flowin’ and I was out of control. I knew I wanted her to have a piece that no one else would have and that’s where I started brainstorming and pinning up a storm. I came across this photo from Sarah Sherman Samuel and was sold.

Ikea Custom Dresser Inspiration

I wanted to do something like this for our sweet baby Harper. Her bedroom colors were roughly, Soft Pink, Mint, Gold, White and Grey. I thought a white dresser with touches of gold could be timeless and something she could use for years to come. So out we went to our nearest IKEA and snatched up the Tarva Dresser. I’ll tell you what, this sucker is not an easy build…well that’s what Mark said at least, but hey, it’s spacious, it’s the size I needed, and it’s going to be stinkin’ cute. So you do what you have to do! We were amazed by the variety TV Bed Store has on furniture styles and more.

We picked out our paint, we picked out our drawer pulls and we were good to go! Having a cluttered and disorganized bedroom closet adds stress and takes time away from your busy days. Whether you need more closet space or just want to find things in your messy bedroom closets, storage cabinet amazon will help transform your space and comfortable bed pillows make the difference. Beautiful design can blend with function when one of our designers helps recommend the right accessories.

Custom Ikea Dresser redo by Happy Chpater

The dresser comes with some thick knobs, but we wanted to add our own touch, so I started by wood filling the holes and we would drill our own holes for the pulls I got later. Finding reliable storage spaces might be a little tricky for you, especially when you are looking forward to store antiques and possessions in a self storage unit. However, there are many self storage facilities that provide you the luxury of choosing a storage unit of your choice, and become free of all worries.

While building the dresser, we did not put the bottom piece on until the end, for two reasons.

  1. We thought the legs were a little too long and we wanted to shorten them up, so Mark cut them down about 2 inches.
  2. I sprayed the entire bottom piece with the Pure Gold spray paint to give it that sort of “dipped” look.

Because I wanted this to be super smooth, we (Mark) sanded it with a 180 grit sandpaper to make it smooth enough to prime. I was preggars, so I did the design on this one and Mark did the hard work. After we sanded, we used a fairly heavy primer because sometimes when you are working with wood like this and white paint, the wood coloring can seep through over time. We used Zinsser B.I.N. primer in white. We sprayed 2 coats of primer and 2 coats of paint with our trusty Graco Truecoat Plus II and the finish was SMOOOOOOTH. We did sand in between with a 220 grit paper, which is a pretty important step if you want it to be buttery smoooooth.

Super excited about the way it turned out.

ikearedonedresser

Custom Ikea Dresser redo by Happy Chapter

Custom Ikea Dresser redo by Happy Chapter

And now our little angel baby cakes has a custom dresser she can use for years!

 

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Red Hot Lacquered Dresser Masterpiece

American of Martinsville 3 Drawer Chest Dresser

Sooooo, it’s taken me a bit to get this beauty finished, but boy was it fun and I totally love how it turned out.

American of Martinsville 3 Drawer Chest Dresser

I tried my hand at oil painting furniture and I’m seriously hooked. I read tips from a few of the awesome bloggers I follow at Little Green Notebook and Natty By Design and mid-project decided I needed to get a spray gun, they are so so good. I chose this little guy and I’m super excited and want to spray like everything now. (Seriously, I was asking Mark if I could spray like every little non colored thing in our house this weekend).

American of Martinsville 3 Drawer Chest Dresser

Anywho – it’s finished. This was a thrift store find, and it actually was really pretty to begin with, it just needed some umph. I fell in love with the fun detail on the drawers and when I got it home, I found it it was an old American of Martinsville piece – score! I used my critter spray gun with Rust-oleum’s Gloss Sunrise Red and a little bit of Mineral Spirits to thin it out. It leveled beautifully. Because I kind of liked the look of some brush marks on the drawers, I painted those by hand with a brush and I like how they turned out too.

Drawer Detail and Pull

American of Martinsville engraved in 3 drawer chest dresser

Leveled Rust-oleum red sunrise gloss

I think it would make a gorgeous entry chest, or a fun statement piece for any room and lucky for us, it’s for sale in my store! So tell me – where would you put this red hot chest of drawers?

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