When hinges creak in doorless chambers, and strange and frightening sounds echo through the halls; Whenever candlelights flicker where the air is deathly still – that is the time when ghosts are present, practicing their terror with ghoulish delight!

Happy Halloween!  I thought this would be the perfect day to share my latest creation with all of you because it’s perfectly bewitching!

Are you scared yet?

Mr. Q and I picked up this waterfall dresser in the dark of night a couple of weekends ago.  The ‘before’ picture is deceptive.  All looks well on the outside, but dig a little deeper and beware of creepy crawly things on the inside.

Seriously, all Halloween references aside, this dresser looked gorgeous in the light from the headlights on our truck, which was all we had to go by.  Even if we’d had more light, I still don’t think we would have looked past what appeared to be a dresser in pristine condition.  Once we got it home and really started to dig in, I realized that this one needed more work than I thought.  The top drawer was very hard to open and close, and there was some veneer damage along the bottom of the sides.  But it was nothing that I couldn’t deal with.

However, the biggest problem was that the seller must have coated this dresser with something to make it look this pretty.  I could feel an oily residue on it.  I suspected that this would be a problem when using milk paint.  So, I sanded it thoroughly, and then just to be double safe, I washed it with a TSP substitute.  Then I totally ignored the little voice in my head that said “maybe you should switch to chalk paint!”, and I painted it with MMS milk paint in Typewriter.

And as the paint dried, that was when I started to get scared.  It was chipping.  A lot.

I wasn’t planning on super chippy, but super chippy is what I got.  Once I got over the intial ‘oh crap, what have I done’ moment, I realized that it actually looked pretty fab.  If you are an afficinado of the chippy look (and I am), this is really a cool dresser.

Let’s just discuss a couple of details before I unveil the dresser in all of its glory.  You may have noticed the little strips of inlaid veneer on the top and bottom drawers.  I thought they were pretty, so I masked them with tape while I painted.  I love how that worked out.

You can also see that I kept the original hardware.  It was just perfect for the dresser.

I also painted the interior behind the top doors black.

That interior space could be a nice way to hide a small TV in the bedroom, if one was so inclined.  It would have to be a small one though.  Aside from a TV, it makes a great space for spare folded blankets, or all of your sweaters.  This would be fun piece for a kitchen though too.  Plenty of storage with a more unique look than cupboards.

As usual, I really struggled with getting any sort of pictures that do justice to this dresser.  It’s just so hard to get good photos of black pieces.  And the contrast between the chippy areas and black paint is much more pronounced in photos than it is in person.  I spent the better part of an afternoon trying to improve my results.  I used a tripod.  I changed my aperture, I played around with my shutter speed.  In the end, this is as good as it got.

So, what do you think of my perfectly spooky make-over?  Who needs a bewitching black dresser?  Anyone?  Sorry, this one is sold.