Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Junk in the Trunk

 
I have long been a fan of vintage shipping trunks and have kept my eye out for one for years.  Whether they are stacked beside the bed as a bedside table or used in the lounge room as a coffee table I love their rustic look.  I'd love to find a trunk in good original condition, I'd like to imagine all the stories that trunk could tell about its travels.



Old trunk painted whiteLove this trunk



On a recent trip to my happy place we found the below trunk.  Although this trunk seems to be a cheaply made one out of fairly thin chipboard and coated steel joinery rather than brass* I thought it had potential and for only $20 thought it was worth a DIY weekend to find out.  




As much I would have loved to keep it as it was is, unfortunately it hadn't been looked after and had flaking paint along with the first signs of mould   So I decided I would try and paint it to give it another lease on life.  I decided on a gold and white stripe effect.  

First I had to scrape off the flaking paint layer.  The original joinery was in a decent condition so I covered these sections in masking tape to leave them as they were.  I then painted the entire trunk in 3 coats of white paint leaving a few hours of drying time between each layer.  I wanted to use fairly thick stripes so I measured each panel to determine the thickness of each stripe.  These were then marked out with masking tape before spraying the gold sections with spray paint..  





After a few hours of drying time, we now have a new trunk for our spare bedroom!





M xx








Images: here, here, here and here

* a quick test with a magnet will help you work this one out.  If the magnet sticks it is not solid brass.

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