Chair by Chair: The Update

Hi Everyone,

This chair thing is really taking a whole lot longer than I had planned.  This is my first foray into chalk paint, and I will tell you that I pretty much hate don't like it.  At all.  These babies would have been done long ago with traditional paint, with a nicer finish I think.  But........after some tweaking, the chairs are coming along and are going to be just great once they are done.  Whenever. That. Might. Be.

Let me say: don't believe a word of the no prep!! Not true. At least not for me.  I cleaned and sanded my pieces, as they were a very shiny, factory finish. The paint still would not adhere.  Luckily, I started with just the one panel.  After I sanded my first attempt off, I gave the chairs a coat of primer.

Now we're cooking with gas and the paint is staying on beautifully.  My main motivator for chalk paint originally was the no prep tantalizer, so that was disappointing to find out that I had to do just as much prep (and a lot more work) as if I was spraying them. Perhaps if my chairs had a different finish to start, things would have been different.  

Here is one  chair with a coat of primer, and a coat of chalk paint.  They have been taking 2 1/2 coats to get a nice finish.

And now - drum roll please - I told you I would be using all the of the paint colors I showed you in a previous post, just not in the way you would expect.  Here is a glimpse of what I did (bear in mind that most need a second coat, or were in the processing of being waxed when I took these photos:

I still have one more color to use, and the fifth chair will be left white. I have waxed the chairs with several coats of clear wax and I am pretty sure I will be using dark wax on just the colored portion of the chairs - the floral carving will pick up the dark wax quite nicely, and the colors will be slightly toned down.

Personally, I am loving the color combo!  I can't wait to get the upholstered seats re-fastened to the chairs and finish things up so I can share the finished product.

That's my update for now.  I am {this close} to being done.

Hope your weekend is going along great!

Thanks for stopping by,
Jane

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