I tried my hand at hand painting a medicine cabinet for the girls bathroom and giving it some shabby chic character. I’m not a huge fan of “paint everything” but I do like a few pieces of furniture, shelving, etc that distinguish it from the rest. This is something I do in moderation. It can get too over the top when EVERYTHING looks old and distressed.
In this case I had an old oak medicine cabinet from our old house that needed some TLC. It’s not very high quality cabinetry, only the doors and frame are actual oak, the rest is mdf or particle board so it was the best jumping off point for me to take a crack at it. You can see the progress below. Enjoy!
The original medicine cabinet.First step was sanding all the old varnish off and cleaning it up.I used a hand sanding block to get into the grooves.I used spray paint for this one because I was impatient. Next time I’ll probably use a brush.I used a combination of three different colors to get the graffiti look I wanted, plush I could show more highlights and depth.The doors I painted a solid green then let them dry. The I painted a two tone yellow and blue over the top and made “paint” layers.Added more blue highlights and dry brushed it.Here I added the blue and yellow to the doors an then dry brushed those colors to give more depth.Once all the paint was completely dry, I used a block sander and sanded all the raised edges, panels and door edges to get that worn look.I was going to paint the antiqued handles, but realized that I kind of liked the looks of the darker worn handles, so I kept them. Just sanded them up a touch.Put the hinges back on and hardware. When you paint the doors they may stick to the frame if you don’t have little stoppers. You can also use flat thumbtacks as stoppers as well.I also used a chestnut stain I had left over to darken the panel grooves. I also dry brushed on some white spray paint on the frame and raised panels. And here it is finished, only took a couple of hours!So I hung it above the girls toilet in their bathroom. My daughters decorated it with their toys.Overall I think it works really well with the colors we had going on.No medicine in these cabinets!
