Dresser rehab: from ick to masculine gray

Until I bought the house, I was living in an odd house sharing arrangement with my ex, which involved one house for the kids, and two apartments (one mine, one his). It was an unhappy situation for everyone, and finding my new doorstep was as much a huge relief that chapter of my life was behind me as joy that my future was ahead of me. Investing in my future, money definitely got spent in ways I enjoyed spending (area rugs and fresh paint) and in ways I didn't ($%^#! plumbing).

What wasn't in the budget was a huge sum for furniture. I was lucky to have the must-haves, namely beds, already. I found some things (curb shopping) and Mom gave me a few other items. But in the end the biggest furniture need with almost no budget to speak of was a dresser for my oldest son. I really had no plans other than a series of laundry baskets.

On other days I've not been so keen on all the stuff the previous owners left on the property (rolls of brittle and crumbling roof tar paper, a bashed up pool table) but I almost overlooked my solution here, which was a twelve-drawer dresser lurking in a damp corner of the basement.

Let me be clear here: it's a piece of crap. It's "vintage", but it was cheap fiberboard and plywood furniture when it was new, and time has not been good to this thing. It was at one time road-sign yellow, and then had been painted an odd, sickly dirty silly-putty pink. It was covered in dirt and infested with spiders.

Anyway. A coat of paint will do wonders for even crappy furniture. Here are my befores:

No inner casing. We're talking quality, folks.

Underwhelming. 

And then here are the afters: I'm not bragging; it's still not a good piece of furniture. But it looks a heck of a lot better, fits in a teenage boy's room, and if I find something better, roomier, and swankier later, I can move on.

I do like the clean lines and the gray against silver.

Confession time: It took me 18 billion years to get this painted. I'd do one drawer face a weekend, or every other weekend, for it seemed like ages, while I kept up with plumbing disasters and drywall projects. Poor kid had no place to rest his clean skivvies. I think he figured I'd never get done.

Still, a piece of furniture can almost always be made to look better, no matter how ugly the start. In the interest of sharing other (and frankly better) ideas, I put together a board on Pinterest. Have fun!