This desk has grown up with me, literally. Santa brought it to me when I was in second grade, my dad put it together in our garage. It has since been repainted once and schlepped around to four city apartments. Countless essays have been written on it, countless piles of crap cleaned up off of it.
From a distance, the desk looked bright white. But close up, it was a disaster. It was very dirty and stained from spilling coffee and diet coke on it many, many times. The underside of it was primed but not fully painted. It had dings and scratches.
Ew, gross.
I could have just bought a new desk, but this desk has history and character (the most important factors for me when choosing things for my home), so I decided to restore it.
I really wanted a high-gloss, liquor like finish and I found this very informative tutorial on Honey and Fizz via Pinterest for painting high-gloss furniture. I learned a couple of things I would have done differently along the way that I’ll explain here. Materials and instructions after the jump!
So first, the supplies. I took this picture prior to actually painting so I’ll amended a couple of things that are pictured here.
- Ammonia and water
- Paper towels
- Electric sander
- Rough sandpaper
- 220 grade fine sandpaper
- Wood filler
- Spray primer
- FLAT paint (important!!)
- Clear gloss spray enamel
- Paint brush
- Sponge brush
- Mask
1. Clean the piece. Since my desk was pretty dirty I scrubbed it down with a water and little ammonia, then wiped it dry with paper towels.
2. Sand. I used my electric sander and rough sand paper to give the desk a good thorough sanding. You can sand by hand if you don’t have an electric sander, its just faster with the electric. Wipe down dust with a damp paper towel.
3. Fill in holes. Fill in all holes and gauges with wood filler. Let dry according to the instructions on the packaging, at least 20 minutes. Sand any excess filler gently with fine sandpaper.
3. Prime. I used spray primer since its a lot faster than the old fashioned kind, but either will work. I just did one coat since the desk was light colored. Let dry and sand out any little imperfections.
After the primer
4. Paint. Dina from Honey and Fizz tutorial suggests using flat paint for “maximum adhesion.” After spending years painting with high-gloss paint only to have it not stick the way I wanted it to, I took her suggestion. It worked like a charm and I will from now on be painting all my furniture with flat paint first unless I’m spray painting. Paint two coats of flat paint sanding between coats.
Flat paint!
5. Dina suggests using a oil based poly in this step to protect your project, I would advise against it. The oil based poly dries yellow, not clear, which is why the drawers of the desk have a slight yellow tint. Also, the finish with the poly tended to bubble leading to a less than perfect finish in some places. I say skip the poly all together or use a water based one that will dry clear.
The less than perfect poly finish.
6. Gloss. The magic thing that turns your project from flat to high gloss wonder is clear high gloss enamel! Just make sure you buy CLEAR enamel and not white enamel like I initially did, and then have to repaint a large portion of your project. Seriously, that happened. I managed to get three coats of gloss out of the two cans I bought, so thats how many layers I did. If I had more gloss, I probably would have done four or five, but I just didn’t have the patience for it. Clean up any drips quickly with a sponge brush.
Overall, I think it turned out really well!
*Editors Note: This is part of a series remaking my entire living room, more to come!
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Beautiful tutorial. I’m in love with the shade of color and trying to find the same tint. Any chance you remember the name of the color you used? Thank you!
Hi Val! The color is 6003-9C Green Gala from Valspar at Lowe’s : )
I have gone through your article and I think, It isn’t all about gloss but how to make your old things new and love it as your history or your partner. I got some existing old white furniture at my place and was about to get new but I think your info would be so useful. Thanks for sharing this informative article.
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Many thanks for sharing High Gloss Furniture Painting Tutorial : CraftHabit.com.
OMG, finally! An easy to understand tutorial on refurbing an old desk and transforming it into a bright, shiny new piece. Excellent work! I’m so excited to try this on my old desk. The types of paint out there is a bit overwhelming (oil/water based, etc), I just wanted to double check a few details….
1) Primer – I know there are different brands but is there only one type of paint primer?
2) Flat paint – I assume Latex will be ok?
3) It’s ok not to use any poly at all, right?
Thank you for sharing!
Hi Chris, thanks for the questions.
1.) any brand of water based primer is good, but spray primer is the fastest way to complete that step.
2.) Yes, regular ol’ flat latex paint that you get from the hardware store works great. I like Bahr paint from Home Depot, but any brand will work.
3.) Yes, I found that the poly is a skipable step as long as you use a couple coats of clear gloss as the last step.
Hope that helps, and best of luck with your project!
Meagan
Hi Meagan,
Great tutorial, I only wish I had looked this up before I started repainting my dresser. I followed the advice of the paint guy at Lowe’s who claimed to have refinished a lot of furniture. I ended up with a super heavy oil based primer and gloss paint that was expensive. l am literally waiting for the third and last coat of gloss paint to dry! After brush priming it and giving it two coats of a teal color, it still felt tacky. I let it dry thoroughly in between coats but it started to get easily scratched as I was putting my stuff back into it several days later. The gloss paint did nothing to give it that hi gloss look you achieved with your piece and I wasn’t thrilled with the color. So back to Lowe’s I went today, got a slightly darker shade of teal and repainted it. Love the color now! I am going to take your advice and skip the poly but will give it 2-3 coats of hi gloss enamel. I think it will then look how I really want it to. . Wish me luck:)
Norma
Good Luck Norma! I would love it if you could send me pics of your finished project and the before pic and I’ll post them on our Facebook page.
-Meagan