Posted 13 years ago
Vestaswind
(49 items)
This old kitchen corner cupboard came out of one of the older houses in my hometown. My guess would be mid 1800's and original to the home. My husband and my sons were not happy about bringing it home, it's very heavy and its hand hewed. I think its walnut. It's missing the top doors but it's a peach.
The guy who gave it to me was remodeling. Everything in his home was very early antiques and I couldn't understand how he could let it go..until I started to strip it. It quite literally had 100 years of paint on it. To make it worse someone put newspaper in the back and repainted it. It took me nearly a year to get it where I wanted it, and my family complained about the ugly heavy thing in the garage. I didn't want it stripped completely because the base color is milk paint that tells its age, stripper was out of the question. In the end all I could save of that was on the inside of the shelves. The knobs are not original to the period, but I'm hoping to fix that.
I had a woman offer me $1,500 when I had it half done. I told her I still had lots of work to do on it. She smiled and said "That's okay, I'm painting it black anyway." I almost swallowed my tougue! It's in my house so you can guess how that ended.
My other freebie came with two old radios out of a barn they were tearing down. It's a tiny pot belly stove. It was in rough shape, but with elbow grease and some sand it came out nice. I have a small flickering lite in it, and I use it for a plant stand.
It comes in handy that everyone knows I'm the resident dumpster diver, everyone knows who to call to dig and haul away anything. Not everyone smiles when the stuff comes home, but after that beast cupboard they know it's worth it in the end.
U GO Girl, Dive right in. I did the same thing in every state I lived in, & will do it still today......
Ya got to Love those Freebie's!!
i'd love to take a dip in the dumpsters with you! great stuff!
Vestaswind: I have a house that was built in 1927, all of the wood work had been painted over when I bought it, I have spent about 15 years scrapping it little by little..........it's a big job since the base boards are about 6" high and mosr of the door molding is about 5" wide. I will try to post some pics later... wish I had some 'before' shots.. I know how hard it is to remove some of those older paints without stripper...That is a pretty piece... Getting older now, think I'm done with the wood work !
I would like to say I would never do it again, but I would. It's a royal pain. The spring clean up is about to happen in my hometown. They take stuff out the curb and everyone from all over digs through it. I will be here with bells on!