Post Sale Musings

This past weekend was the October sale at The Mine, and the first weekend that featured an entire second floor of merchandise enabled by a radical expansion and change in ownership status. The second floor is a pretty amazing space–tall, tin-clad ceilings, windows, new carpet, a nice bathroom, street-level doors and, most importantly, space for larger pieces of furniture. The philosophy is that “smalls” are to be used sparingly, and “in context,” so I still have my space on the lower level for my kitchen things–but, I share a small, L-shaped area on the second floor with my friend Jack. It was a challenging puzzle, but we were able to fit in most everything we needed to, and it looked integrated and cohesive. I was happiest that the space could actually fit my metal wardrobe comfortably, and happier still that it sold! I’m getting a little discouraged about lack of sales for the checked pieces–maybe it’s time for another theme. I’ve been snagging the New York Times magazine on Sundays from YJ’s Snack Bar where I meet friends for breakfast, and it’s chock-full of wonderful inspiration. Unfortunately, I’m out of pieces to work on, so the hunt begins in earnest again tomorrow. I would love to find more metal pieces; we’ll see what the junking spirits bring.

It’s also time to focus my search for things that would make interesting Christmas gifts. A few years before I started junking as a business, I initiated a “green Christmas” at my house, which in essence meant nothing purchased for giving could be new. My daughters love it, and we continue the tradition for most things, although I have wrapped up new items if it’s important–like a GPS for my daughter who drives in Southern California. I love it because I find perfect gifts all year long since I’m going to so many more places and more often than before–the biggest challenge is actually saving things for Christmas since it’s so much fun seeing their reactions.

But, there’s always more junk!

(Just for the record, this little grouping was my Halloween tableau. And that’s a vintage carved cocoanut on the right, not a shrunken head. I’ve avoided buying dead things except for the occasional fur piece (don’t judge), even though I’ve seen many a taxidermic hunting trophy sell at different markets for a pretty penny.)

The Industrial Armoire

After several weeks and many interim projects, the metal wardrobe makes its grand entrance! The very first comment I got on this blog was from someone I don’t know who cautioned me not to lose the patina of this piece. I liken “patina” to “character” and I think I kept that intact. It’s definitely different from where it started. Something of this age can never be made “new” again, so the steel is not perfectly un-dented and will always have a few rust stains from poor storage. After I stripped off the deteriorating exterior paint, however, I knew I couldn’t cover it up entirely. The imperfections were lovely. The bottom of the wardrobe was pretty well rusted out and definitely needed a little more than paint removal. After priming with heavy rust primer, I painted it a mocha color to coordinate with the original handles which I wanted to keep. The oversized harlequin checks are a great scale for this and I love the red with the steel. I finished it all up with a couple of coats of lacquer to protect it from rust, and changed the cam locks since the original keys had been lost.

The repair work I had to do consisted primarily of the floor. I wanted to attach casters but with the rusted condition of the floor I knew I had to do something to reinforce it. The first step was filling in the few actual holes with Bondo. After sanding, I applied heavy rust primer inside and out to kill the rust and stop further damage. Then I cut 3/4″ plywood to fit and glued it down with liquid nails. I used heavy bolts to affix the casters rather than screws, for added security.

Love!

By the way, it will be for sale at Urban Mining October 8, 9 & 10. Or hopefully just October 8!

Mea Culpa, Formica-Topped Table

Okay, this is what I had to work with. Originally, this table was assembled in the usual manner, legs on the bottom, top well, on the top. It was pretty cool, not the coolest formica-topped table I’d ever seen, but the price was right and I didn’t think I’d be doing too much to it before reselling–de-rusting and cleaning. Well, I purchased this before I rented my workspace, so it bravely withstood a couple of rain storms standing in my driveway since my garage was too full. As a result, the formica started to separate from the base of the top. Thinking it would be a pretty easy fix, I started gluing (Gorilla Glue, if anyone’s interested) and tried to pull everything together with those ratchety things. What with the the angle of the table, and the ferocity of the glue and various user errors with regard to the ratchety things, it sort of ended up looking like the unfortunate picture on the left. The legs were still awesome, so I waited patiently until a different tabletop would come into my life.

And, it did, last week.

Fast forward. The curbside table as a whole was pretty beat up, so I just salvaged the top. The biggest challenge was figuring out the best way to marry the new top to the chrome legs. I thought I could simply attach the legs to the top, but the height wouldn’t have been correct, so I used parts and pieces from the original top and made it work. After many pieces of sandpaper (by the way, a tip: That purple sandpaper you can get now? It really lasts longer than the standard stuff.) it was ready for paint. I think it’s fun!

Nota Bene: This design is not a target. It’s a bull’s eye. Really.

Metal Wardrobe

This is what I had to start with. I could tell that under all those dents, all that rust and despite the flaking brown paint this vintage steel wardrobe could be awesome.

I had first thought I’d paint an overall color and do a tone-on-tone large checked pattern, but when we were moving it, the brown paint flaked off onto our hands. Instead, I removed all the paint (mostly by just rubbing, and sanding off the rest), and revealed a great industrial look. The rust and resultant holes on the bottom are more problematic, but I think I have a good solution for that.

I was hoping to finish this project this week, but the wardrobe is so dang big, the sanding is taking longer than anticipated. I’ve got several other projects that need to be finished before I move into River Market so this is going to to sit for a few more days.

My Checkered Past

My first, long-neglected blog was focused three ways, as I sorted out where I would go after early retirement from a very large greeting card company in Kansas City, Missouri. I’m a designer by trade and previous employment, and I really couldn’t see giving that up entirely, so that was focus number one. Secondly, on a lark, I took a bartending course and thought about getting a job serving up booze and wisdom to poor souls in a smoky joint somewhere, so I bloggedly dabbled in mixology, too. Finally, I had recently stumbled upon the mother of all junk stores that had a stockpile of restaurant ware which inspired me to buy a bunch of it to sell on Etsy. Of course there were all sorts of other things to buy and sell besides restaurant ware, and plenty of other places to go to buy it. To say I jumped into this third category with both feet would be an understatement.

The blog was fun, and more importantly, over the months I kept at it, it became clear where my real passion lie–junking, or picking, or thrifting, or antiquing, or whatever you wish to call hunting down previously used, pretty old merchandise. Since much of what I found was too large to easily sell and ship from my Etsy shop, I eventually acquired a booth in a monthly vintage market to sell my things.

In the beginning I wasn’t much interested in furniture. That changed radically. I love furniture–not perfectly lovely, as-is furniture, but rather homely, neglected, in-need-of-love furniture that I can transform and at times repurpose into something unexpected, useful and perhaps even beautiful.

A few months ago, I rented a work and storage space so I could refurbish more efficiently than on my patio, garage, kitchen and living room. More recently, as I was painting a checkerboard pattern on the top of an abused, yet beautiful oak teacher’s desk, my endeavor acquired a name–Checkered Past.

I started selling my furniture (and stuff) at Urban Mining Homewares then spent a few months at Bottoms Up, both of which are occasional vintage markets, open only the first friday weekends of each month. All that’s going to change at the end of this month, when I move into a small space at the River Market Antique Mall, which is open seven days a week. While I’ll be selling “stuff” too, I hope my little space at River Market will be piled to the rafters with reclaimed furniture that people will love to have in their homes. (I’m staying at Urban Mining, so I’ll have two places in Kansas City for you to see my work.)

I want to chart my progress and share some of my projects, with plenty of before and after pictures and perhaps some how-to’s thrown in as well–hence my new blog. Today I picked up an amazing steel wardrobe (dented and neglected, of course) at Goodwill that will be my first before/after piece. I hope you enjoy the process and perhaps gain some inspiration along the way to give a little TLC to some of your own furniture.

P.S. I’ll do the TLC for you! I do custom work!