Sorry for the radio silence last week, folks – I got hit with a bit of a crummy cold that I’m still getting over and instead of doing the sensible thing and staying home from work and oh I don’t know, SLEEPING, I decided to be the martyr and go to work all week* and then try to not die when I got home.  Hmm. As a result, I’m sure this thing has dragged out longer than it should have.  Lesson learned.

*My sincerest apologies to my colleagues for putting up with my grossness this week as well as putting them at risk of possible infection. I am a horrible, horrible person.

Now, you may remember me moaning about the fact that I couldn’t find a decent television stand for love nor money. A couple things I was looking for as a reminder:
  • I wanted something interesting and vintage to ground the ‘newness’ of the room since I’d replaced my coffee table with something more contemporary
  • It had to fit the rather narrow dimensions of my alcove (90cm wide) – this was my biggest sticking point as I’d seen plenty I liked, they just weren’t the right size!
  • I specifically wanted a cabinet to offset the chest of drawers on the opposite alcove
  • It needed to be considerably taller than the current stand (similar in height to said chest of drawers)
  • I didn’t want to spend more than around £150 at the most
  • I decided against a built in cabinet because I thought it might look odd without a built in on the other side
  • I’d discounted finding a large cabinet to totally hide the television because most were too wide for the alcove or they were simply too far outside my budget (see previous bullet point re tiny budget)
A reminder of the shiny black monstrosity I’m replacing…

Well, I think it was the week after I posted about my frustration, I decided to widen my search to the rest of the country.  The Fates or the Universe or someone up there must have heard me because I came across the PERFECT Art Deco cabinet on eBay. It was within budget (£45!!), needed a bit of work but the lines were fantastic.  The only issue was that it was on the other side of the country – so I figured I had nothing to lose and asked the seller if she would be willing to use a courier if I made the arrangements.  Happily, she was super nice about it and agreed! Whoop! The costs for a courier were £49 (I used Shiply, it’s a great little service for eBay buying if you’re not familiar with it) so all in, the cabinet cost me less than £100.  I think it was definitely worth it.

Here she is all ready for her makeover….
Check out those sexy legs!! Rrrowwrrrl!

 

And her sexy hardware!!  Ooh be still my little Chinoiserie lovin’ heart!

 

 

It is, however, missing the back completely and missing her shelf…

And yes, she’s getting a makeover because the finish isn’t in great shape and I’m really not keen on the colour of the wood (it looks better in the pictures than it does in person, trust me).

I know there are people who wouldn’t DREAM of painting a piece of furniture but this isn’t by any means a valuable antique so in my books, it’s okay. My furniture, my money – it’s gettin’ done!

Here’s the plan:

  1. Sand, prime and paint in glossy white
  2. Shine up hardware with Brasso
  3. Replace glass with mirror
  4. Create internal shelf
  5. Reinstate back of cabinet with MDF (partially covered as we need to allow for cables to come out the back)

Easy enough, right? Stay tuned for her grand debut soon!  And yes, I’m refinishing this piece of furniture right in my lounge because there is NO ROOM anywhere in my house for this kind of work but we don’t have a garage, the spare room is full of stuff from the bathroom remodel and the weather isn’t nice enough this weekend to do it outside. Not ideal but hey, I’m impatient and not about to have to wait until the sun comes out to get on with the job at hand.

What do you think of my find? Have you landed any bargain furniture pieces recently? Do tell!
Don’t miss a thing!

 


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