I'm Dreaming of a White......

I mentioned in a previous blog that nice white furniture is hard to find.  It's not that hard to find almost white furniture, but really white furniture.....  So one has to get creative.  I had a great empty space against the wall next to my front door and since that area is also my "Study" (sounds a little snooty, oh well) and because I needed some storage for files and such, I decided it was the perfect place to put a big file cabinet type thing.  Some file cabinet furniture looks too much like office furniture and usually doesn't come in white.  I found this great piece at www.homedecorators.com.  I've gotten a lot of stuff from them, trouble is you have to put everything together yourself.  The cabinet I chose, had NINE drawers...wooof!  Oh, almost forgot to mention, the cabinet I chose only came in black. Here's what the thing looked like after I finished putting it together.

This piece is pretty large and holds a lot.  I really like the three top drawers.  Great storage.  But black wasn't going to work for my decor, so I had to paint it white.  The white color I used throughout my apartment is Benjamin Moore Super White.  It took roughly three coats to make it into the beauty it is now.  I wanted to add a really cool design element to the front drawers, so I sketched different designs and at the end I was inspired by the wallpaper that I am going to put up in the dining room above the chair rail molding.  The wallpaper is made by Graham & Brown, the pattern is called Darcy, www.grahambrown.com, and looks like this.

Using the design I put down on paper, I then cut it out onto stencil paper using an exacto knife.  I then taped the stencil to the first file drawer and using silver metallic acrylic paint, I carefully painted the design.  Once the initial painting was done, I removed the stencil and I then went over the design until the paint was dark enough and the look was fully realized.  Here is what it looked like along the way.

You'll notice, I wanted the pattern to connect to each drawer.  Depending on how the light hits, you see flashes of metallic.  Above the cabinet, I wanted to display some of my photography.  I had nine photos printed by www.Kodakgallery.com  8 x 10 and got nine 8 x 10 white frames from Target and hung them above the cabinet.  I picked the photos based on their composition and color.  You may laugh, but I printed out little thumbnails of many photos I took and put tape of the back of each one and then arranged and rearranged them on paper so I could be sure to get the look and order that I wanted.  Type A personality, I guess.  Also important was what to put on the top of the cabinet.  I needed a lamp, some decorative objects and a place to rest my handbag.  I found a beautiful crystal lamp from Home Goods, along with a silver tray with white quartz handles and a faux orchid plant.  My good friends gave me this gorgeous crystal bowl from Michael C. Fina and I filled it with crystal paperweights in various gemstone cuts that I found on www.onekingslane.com.  Got to have my bling where ever I go. Oh and I found this white runner at Burlington Coat Factory for nothing and it protects the surface of the counter. Anyway, here is what it all looks like. 

Here's a close up of the gems :)

Thanks for stopping by and stay tuned for more creativity.