Thursday, February 25, 2016

A huge big desk gets a new life

Friends of ours recently bought a new house and had to change out their office furniture to fit everything in. Luke had a beautiful desk that he had brought with him from New Zealand. It was too large to fit in the new study so he wanted me to take it and  "Lilyfield Life" it. The desk is massive and I took some convincing as I knew it would take up a lot of room in my studio but the shape was so gorgeous that I ended up saying yes. The top was in bad shape with lots of scratched and peeling varnish so I sanded and sanded and sanded it to make it gorgeously smooth again. The timber was seriously divine under all the varnish and scratches so I decided to just enhance it with dark wax. I don't have a before photo but imagine this all scratched and much more orange.  The desk isn't pine - probably some NZ timber that I don't know.


timber french style desk hand painted by Lilyfield Life

For the rest of the desk I gave it two coats of primer and painted it with a lovely fresh Porters Paints chalk emulsion. I then sealed it with clear wax.  I decided to not distress this piece as I loved the crispness and neatness of it. If that makes sense.

timber french style desk hand painted by Lilyfield Life
Progress photo - you can see the wax looks patchy before it's been buffed.

When I listed it for sale on social media, it was snapped up very quickly and I had a whole slew of people wanting to buy it. I was surprised as I thought initially that it would have been too big for most people's houses but I forget that I live in the inner west and we all have houses on the smaller side. The desk was actually bought by the wife of one of Phil's best friends from university. Small world. I didn't even know Susan followed Lilyfield Life. So good to catch up with Susan and Mark. It's been too long. We had a lovely chat when they came to pick it up and have made a promise to catch up more regularly. They are just completing a renovation and the freshly painted desk is perfect for their home office. 

timber french style desk hand painted by Lilyfield Life

And so it's off to its new life. 

And I'm off to paint more lovely pieces.

Fiona xx


3 comments:

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