I've started writing a bedroom makeover post but in the meantime (until I can take some better photos), I wanted to write a review of
Upcycled Boutique who helped us find some awesome new furniture and give a new lease of life to my old dressing table.
Upcycled Boutique will paint old chests (or any other furniture) to match your decor and add whatever knobs you wish. I was very impressed with the service, value for money and quality provided.
I found them on Facebook when I spotted a chest of drawers I thought would look lovely when painted. Unfortunately the one I had my eye on turned out to be too big and another I liked was sold to someone else in the meantime but Emma said she'd find something for me and before long, she sent me pictures of an old cherry wood chest of drawers complete with gorgeous brass handles.
We discussed the colour and finish I'd like and I have her a swatch which she then mixed up a chalk paint to match before sending me a small wooden swatch to check. The finished result shows off the gold colour of the brass handles against the mid-dark grey which matches our bed and is so much nicer than the old Malm we had, I love it! It cost us just £140 for a custom hand painted, solid wood chest of drawers. You also have 14 days after delivery to change your mind if you're not happy with it which is a great reassurance when you don't really know how it will look once painted.
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| Now I just need to get those orangey doors painted to match the wall! |
Of course I then changed things around a bit and added my new golden elephant I bought at a flea market in Seremban, Malaysia. We still love Nik's cufflink box which we bought in Sorrento, Italy and I switched the painting from Sri Lanka for my peacock drawing from Etsy.
I was so pleased with the new drawers, I contacted Upcycled Boutique for a quote to paint my dressing table. My dressing table cost me around £500 8 years ago and I still love it. It's made of solid Oak with a vintage look and without being too chunky. It just didn't quite fit in with our new, modern house like it did in our Victorian tenement flat. It looked too dark with the brighter furniture and double aspect windows. I wanted to freshen it up a bit and get it to fit in with our new, more modern decor a bit more. I chose a colour to tone in with the new wall colour I have planned, as well as re-upholstering the stool in the same fabric as our ottoman and we were quoted £120 plus the fabric cost. I'd already bought new knobs for the drawers although could only find 4 in the design I liked (with gold dragonflies on) so I decided to remove the one from the false drawer in the middle and have the hole filled in and painted over.
Obviously the same returns guarantee can't be applied when having your own furniture painted as you own the piece so choose your colour wisely. Unfortunately, and through no fault of Upcycled Boutique, the colour I chose did not turn out as I expected and I wasn't sure of the policy in such an instance. I had waited for a swatch to confirm the colour again as with the grey, since they were going to mix up the chalk paint to match my chosen colour (a paint swatch from Little Green which was a lighter shade of the wall colour I planned, I didn't want everything to be grey but I didn't want a bright colour so I went for this muted blue-grey-green), instead they found a place which could colour match to make up a chalk paint in any colour so they went ahead with that. When my dressing table came back I was initially surprised by how very green it looked, despite being a perfect match to the 1" swatch, it was not the muted, fresh shade I had imagined. It was much more intense colour than expected but I thought I should check it in daylight and artificial light to decide if I liked it or not. I did not. It's amazing how different a colour can look when not in a book of tiny swatches with differing shades surrounding it!
On closer inspection I'd noticed a few areas around the drawers which were showing the old wood at the edges and on the top of the stool under the new upholstery as it no longer had a trim. I contacted them about the issues with the wood showing and Emma sent the perfect response apologising for the areas and the other issues we'd had involving some delay in getting it back to us. She offered to repaint it all to their usual standard and when I mentioned that I was actually quite unsure about the colour and was happy to pay something towards re-doing it if it could be in a different colour, she offered to re-do it in the new colour if I bought the paint. I was more than happy with this as a fair option and this time I double checked my choice myself by buying a tester and painting a large sheet of lining paper to see it in the room.
The new colour is Salix by Little Greene. I absolutely love it, it's how I originally imagined it although is more blue than I thought it would be depending on the light but is still more green than a duck egg blue. It goes much better with my dragonfly knobs too. (I took the old middle one off as I could only find 4, in the sale from Zara Home in Saudi, and the middle is a false drawer anyway as the top lifts up.) I had been very nervous as I was worried in case it didn't turn out as I imagined and I might regret ruining such an expensive item. Luckily (despite the little mishap in the middle where I worried I'd done just that), I now love it even more than before and it looks so much fresher and better in the room!
Of course I then had to tidy up the top and windowsill to match too. I bought a white glass tray from TK Maxx to make my perfumes look a bit tidier (they used to be lined up along the middle at the back - I had already moved them when I took the before photo). I put some new white frames from Homebase on the windowsill and moved my big vase to the spare room. The silver plated animals are from a set of four which I bought in one of Lewes' wonderful antique shops. The little oil lamp is from our trip to South Korea back in 2013 and was the item I was using to match the new colours to. I'm so pleased with the final match, it even goes with my favourite perfume!
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| My antique silver plated animals could do with a polish! |
I would definitely recommend Upcycled Boutique for furniture painting jobs and beautiful up-cycled pieces at great prices. Although we experienced a couple of delays, this is just an unfortunate result of being a small family run business, things come up and I was happy to wait. Emma was great at communicating and answered my many questions quickly and gave us lots of advice. I'm sure I was an awful client what with being so fussy and changing my mind about the colour but she was always friendly and helpful. I love my new furniture!
