« b.y.o. brass class »

May 8th, 2012

we had a super-fun workshop last saturday…four lovely students (all at varying levels of experience) each brought a lamp base (3 brass, one ceramic) in for a re-vamp.  they did a fantastic job, as evidenced below:

(patty, who swears she has never painted anything before, scored this great brass lamp at the oxford goodwill for $3.99 and put the coolest crusty weathered zinc finish on it, using graphite and louis blue chalk paint as a base.)

(lisa’s lamp was rescued from their flooded hunting camp.  the brass finish was ruined, but she made it fabulous with annie sloan’s olive and old ochre, and pewter gilding wax.)

(jackie has had this ginger jar lamp since high school – it had been frighteningly bright and shiny, but she made it gleam like old polished plaster with country grey and old white under annie’s soft waxes.)

the group learned three different annie sloan chalk paint finishes, and chose one for their lamp.  during “dry times” we chatted about fix-ups for shades, favorite places to flea, and alternate methods using metallics.  it was a wonderful group – i can’t wait until they come back with pictures of their finished lamps in situ.  gold stars for everyone!

(matt went for a mellow antiqued gold finish for his floor lamp, beginning with graphite.  bravo!)

« now you see it… »

May 6th, 2012

…and, hopefully, now you don’t.

with the craziness of renovating the studio and keeping all other current balls in the air, it was fun to take time out to work in a little nancy-drew-ing and repair a lovely client’s concrete floor.   annie sloan chalk paint in old ochre was a great starting point: close to the background color of the existing floor and providing an excellent bond to the concrete.  a little tweaking with tinted glazes and it was ready to seal.  (and now, the home is ready for the realtors’ open house.)

« mrs. jones gets framed »

April 11th, 2012

my seeking a way to display samples of all of annie sloan’s 29 fabulous colors intersected directly with my friend chris garner‘s desire to try the chalk paint and to divest himself of some frames from the “scratch & dent” pile at his shop (from where, as you know, the most gorgeous frames and mirrors come.)  it resulted in this happy situation on the walls at my studio:

now chalk paint shoppers can easily see, touch, and compare all the hues.  there is lots of fabric-swatch-holding-up going on too, which is really fun to see.

(here is a “before” of my haul from his attic:)

and just wait until you see the gorgeous moldings chris is creating with some of annie’s colors, her waxes, and a little gilding.  i can’t wait to show you.

« paris gray table »

March 30th, 2012

among all the wonderful antiquing spots in our neighborhood (just check the studio page for a list) there is a great j.u.n.q.u.e. shop just around the corner from me & mrs. jones on central avenue – gary’s antiques. gary and his cohorts comb estate sales, flea markets, auctions (and, sometimes, i think, the curb) for their signature crazy blend of merchandise. he also occasionally builds tables from reclaimed pieces, such as this one i snagged recently…the base is an old plantation desk whose slanted top had been lost/stolen/ruined. gary constructed a new top and refinished the whole piece.

i love it for its size, sturdiness, bottom shelf, the original brass banding at the bottom of the legs, and extra-tall height…counter stools will fit nicely some day when it has retired from its new job as display in the shop…but the new finish was very, well, new. here it was before:

and after:

the finish is annie sloan’s paris gray with clear wax over it, a distressed band of old white on the edges, and dark wax rubbed into the knots and exposed wood for a tiny bit of age.

please don’t tell gary that i painted over his stain & varnish! i’ve also just come home with a long farm-style table that he built using a set of old turned legs that will serve as worktable in the classroom. stay tuned for that transformation, coming soon.

« chinese chippendale lite »

March 23rd, 2012

here is a before & after of some fab estate-sale chairs in which anna baskin lattimore spied the potential.  they arrived like so:

and now are at home freshened up with beautiful new upholstery and sleek coats of benjamin moore’s palace white, #oc.100:

of course this so-shiny-it-still-looks-wet look is only possible with hollandlac brilliant.  i’ve recently had some good questions about working with this amazing (but sometimes tricky) fpe paint, and will try to answer those in a post coming soon that will feature the third chair in this set, done up in a gorgeous green.