Identity Crisis

Have you seen some of the library card catalogues that have been made over?   I have pinned some pretty examples on Pinterest.  Check them out HERE.



I really like the look of card catalogues in room design...but...what could I do?  I didn't have an old card catalogue to make over.
But, I did have this:

It's a jewelry box.  Boring, old, brown-painted wood.  (It's not a very good photo, sorry, but it shows how it looked when I brought it home from the thrift store.)  It was about five dollars.  The "hardware" is just wire rings...pretty much the same as cheap key chain rings.  Weird, huh!?  But it had a bit of a 'card catalogue' vibe to it. 

I call it Card Cataloguesque.  :)

I also had these hanging around...and they remind me of the card catalogue hardware...

I removed all those wire rings:

 Once I had them all removed it looked like this:

Then I got out some other supplies:

A few different colors of paint
Some Glazing Medium
A wood-graining tool
Oil-Rubbed Bronze spray paint
A few wooden beads and some fishing line
Little tiny nails
My trusty hammer (we have a love-hate relationship)

And I went to work.

First, I white-washed the wood.

Then, I painted a layer of glaze-medium and paint over that.

Finally, I ran the wood-grain tool down the sides and fronts...

gently rocking it back and forth as I drug it along the surface.

I did the base of the box in white, but did some of the drawers in brown and green to give it some interest.

While the paint and glaze dried, I sprayed the brass hardware with the oil-rubbed bronze paint.

Once everything was completely dry, I nailed the hardware to the little drawer fronts and added labels that I printed in MS Word.  And the smallest drawers got a wooden bead as a knob.

AND...my 'card cataloguesque' jewelry box!

It has a bit of a Cottage feel to it.  That's the direction I was trying to go.  It's a little bit Shabby, but that's only because I have very bad aim and beat it up with my hammer.   Better IT than my FINGERS.   

Regardless of a possible identity crisis (on the jewelry boxes part) ~ It's just the right size to sit on the bathroom vanity and hold all of my jewelry.  AND...I'll know which drawer to look in when I want to find something.  Plus plus for me :)