Upcycle Your Furniture to Create Style While Saving $

As I've mentioned in my introduction post, I want a champagne house but on a beer budget. I love to decorate, but have had to become more creative in order to achieve my desired effect while remembering that I will soon have four teenage boys that will need braces, lots and lots of food, and money for college (sigh...can't they just stay babies??).

So along comes furniture upcycling. This trend seems to be on the upswing with many new shows such as Salvage Dawgs, and incorporated into existing shows such as Rehab Addict.

upcycle: (verb) reuse (discarded objects or material) in such a way as to create a product of a higher quality or value than the original.

I wouldn't necessarily say that upcycling gives the product higher quality or value than the original, but more like it gives it higher quality or value than the state in which it was found. My family lives on the edge of an area where Antique shops can be found all over the place. I used to look at these stores with rusted and broken furniture laying all of the lawn and think, "ugh, who would buy this junk?" Now that I've taken to upcycling, I have definitely gained a new appreciation for these items. Although, I find that many of these shops offer these items for a hefty price too, all for the label of "Antique". So why would I want to spend a lot of money on an old item, then more money and time to refinish it? Then I stumbled upon the goldmine which is Craigslist and Facebook yard sale sites. I have come across many furniture items that are deeply discounted mostly for the fact that these people want to get rid of it quickly. But again, I'm still spending money to buy old furniture.

And then along comes the dumpster diving (hanging head in shame...:)). Okay, not literally dumpster diving. But have you ever driven along a dirt road and saw an old pallet lying in the woods and thought, "hmm, I bet that doesn't belong to anyone, I could probably make something cool with it." No? Um, yeah, neither have I...;) Freecycle offers a more respectable form of dumpster diving. You have to be on top of your game to get the good stuff before others grab it, but you would be surprised at how many gently used items are given away for free. And that was how my garage and dining room filled up with dusty, broken "junk" and my husband began eyeing me as a crazy hoarder.



So the first item that I upcycled was one piece of an old media cabinet. I actually obtained this item from a friend who was given it by a friend who found it being thrown out. There were actually three pieces that were supposed to be stacked on top of each other to create a monster media cabinet meant for an old-style tube television. I decided to take one of the sections, add legs to it, and turn it into a buffet for my covered deck. It is amazing how perfect this ended up working for me. It is very long, but not very deep, so created a nice accent piece on the deck with functional space, but still leaving plenty of room for my table. I decided on Annie Sloan Chalk Paint in Emperor's Silk to create a bold accent piece. Because chalk paint isn't necessarily meant for outdoor use when finished with wax, a local stockist recommended that I create a dark wax wash instead with a mixture of dark wax and mineral spirits. So far it has held up okay, but I'm interested to see how it is looking at the end of this Winter and Spring. I am still undecided about whether to put a more protective coat on the outside of it.

Before, with legs added

After

After a great response to how this piece turned out, I took another section of it from my friend to create a buffet for another friend's house. She actually decided to cut the legs a little shorter and is now using it as a sofa table. I love how this piece looks in her house and how your eyes are really drawn to it as you walk in.

The third section was kept by my friend and she did a similar upcycle of it to turn it into a media cabinet to sit under her mounted flat screen. Even her skeptical husband has agreed that it looks good and it has really transformed her space and given her a launching point from which to begin decorating the rest of the room, not to mention storage for media components, DVDs, toys and blankets.

I think the biggest piece of advice to take away from this article is to try and think outside of the box. Don't walk into a shop, fall in love with an amazing piece of distressed furniture and spend a fortune on it. Take a picture of it, then brainstorm how you can re-create it:) With a bit of creativity and elbow grease, you could easily stumble upon a free or very inexpensive item that can be turned into a one-of-a-kind statement piece for your home.