Before & After China Cabinet

My grandparents had this beautiful China Hutch and Buffet set that my Papa bought my Nana for their 25th wedding anniversary.  It was big and heavy and solid wood.  When I think of family gatherings, parties, holiday meal in their dinning room growing up that piece of furniture is in every memory.  So when my Nana and Papa had to move to a smaller apartment because they were getting too old to take care of a big house they no longer had room for it.  I jumped at the opportunity to have it passed down to me, the only granddaughter.  Yep I played that card to get it.  But come to find out the buffet part was down in Houston at some cousins house for some still unknown reason to me and when we called to request MY GRANDPARENTS piece of furniture back, we were impolitely told no.  So I had this enormous hutch but no buffet/table to set it on.  So it just sat against the wall not looking right at all.

I spent nearly 3 years looking for a buffet that was in my budget and had the right dimensions to fit as well as it needed to be a solid piece of wood.  Then a few weeks ago I did a search on CL with just the dimensions and a dresser came up.  HMMM never thought about using a dresser for the buffet.  That day I found the piece I was looking for in the form of a dresser, Poppa went and picked it up and Momma got to work on putting it all together.

Now I learned a lot from working on this DIY project.  I opted out of sanding and went with 2 coats of primer instead.  Normally I'd sand but this saved me a lot of time and the primer covered well.  However next time I think I'll go with a spray primer as using a paint brush just took forever and made my arm very sore.  That's probably due more to the fact that I'm out of shape though. One thing good though about using a brush to paint is your little monkey can help. Boy we both are looking rough here!

Here she was so proud because she painted the letter C. 

I used a brush nickle spray paint to turn that brass into some sass! 

Black was the color of choice.  I've been collecting white dishes and serving platters for a few years and thought the black with the white would just pop.  Plus our walls are white in our rental home so need something to add contrast to it.  We took the doors off and once they were off we decided we liked the look of it and kept them off. (and please don't mind the red and turquoise squares still up from the Cat In The Hat Party, don't worry they are down now. )

I just love the way it turned out.  Sometimes I get home and just go and stand in front of it and stare it, I've even been caught hugging it. 
So once again here is the Before

And here is the After

My Papa died 2 years ago, 3 weeks after Monkey was born and so this piece has even more of a value to me.  I hope to pass it on to my grandchildren one day.  Until then though I will be showing it all my love! 


What do you think?  I was thinking of distressing it a bit and or glazing it but just haven't made up my mind.
I have a few more DIY projects I need to finish and get posted but they seem to keep getting put on the back burner.  You know cause a glass of wine or taking a nap always seems more fun. :)

Happy Friday Ya'll.