Tuesday's customer inspiration - Kim's silver-leaf beauty!

Good afternoon and welcome to today's installment of customer inspiration where I showcase something someone has purchased at Jubilee Furniture and either how wonderful it looks in their home - exactly as it looked when it left the store - or - how it's been enhanced and in today's case TRANSFORMED into something new and different and amazing.

Here's Kim's email: Okay! I have my little "make-over" furniture that I purchased at Jubilee Furniture about a month ago...it just takes a little time to do a beautiful transformation!

I bought this little cabinet for $10 dollars at your store. What a deal! I wanted to modernize it so my twin boys would think it's cool! It's going to be used for storage under a desk. Turned out it was a little too tall to fit under the desk, so I cut it down.

It started out brown with a brass handle. I lightly sanded it and washed it down with TSP a cleaner that was commonly used on paneling in the 70's before painting it. I glazed it with a silver oil based paint and then silver-leafed the door for a contemporary look. Lastly, I changed the hardware to chrome to match with the legs on the desk chairs!

It was a lot of fun doing this project and it's always fun finding good deals at Jubilee Furniture!

Doesn't even look like the same furniture. If anyone has any questions on refinishing or has some tips to share, they can email me at kimberlyann711@aol.com

I asked Kim how she did the silver-leafing and here are her directions:

Silver leafing or gold leafing isn't too hard and there are a few short "you tubes" that even show it. It's a matter of buying a glue called "size." This glue gets tacky and allows you to put on the silver leaf. The silver or gold leafing comes in sheets about the size of 3 x 5 and you can buy all this at Hobby Lobby, Joann Fabrics or Michael's. The trickiest part of leafing, is that, the leafing sheets are a little delicate to work with. Since I was going for the crackled look, it didn't matter. A tip I can offer, make sure the glue is a little dry - in a tacky state - before starting to place the sheets down.

Wow - what a difference in the before and after shots! It really DOESN'T look like the same piece of furniture! Well done, Kim and many thanks for sharing! Do your boys think it's "cool"?

Have you purchased something from Jubilee Furniture and are willing to share? If so, please email me at sgalbraith@outreachcommin.org with a couple of photos and help inspire others as we make the world a little more beautiful!

See you, dear reader, back here on Friday with my weekly update! Be there or be square! :-)