Okay, guys. I heard you loud and clear. After I received your post here on the blog about painting my entryway console table, I also posted a poll on my Fabebook page and after looking through over 575 comments, the overwhelming majority of people felt that I should leave the console as is, in its natural wood tone. My favorite comment was something like, “Put the brush down and go back.”
So I understand you. I’ll still try to do something to even out the spots and hopefully reduce the orange tone. Apparently I still need to install the missing drawer panel and possibly try removing the bottom shelf too. Since the console is still a wood tone, I decided to do something different with the lamps instead. I decided to keep these lamps and give them a new face. (Just a random piece of information, I not like buffet lamps. They’re just not my style, so they were never an option for me.)
So when I was thinking about what to do with the lamps, the first and obvious decision was to paint them. But I really wanted something more unique than spray painted lamps. And then I decided to try something with the art pastels I used earlier this week to repair the patched holes in the wallpaper mural. (You can read more about this here.)
But first I had to decide on the general color I wanted the lamps to be. I chose three different options from my huge selection of spray paints I already had on hand and tested all three colors on one lamp. First I tried this darker green.
I also tried this lighter green. Again, this would just serve as a base color for the pastel tones applied on top.
And finally I tried pink.
Pink was the obvious winner for me. The other two somehow got lost in front of the mural.
After giving the two lamp bases a few coats of spray paint and letting them dry completely, I started with my idea for the pastels. My original idea was to create a gradient design where the color gets darker at the bottom and gradually gets lighter towards the top. I used a total of five different colors, starting with black at the bottom, followed by red, two shades of pink, and ending with white at the top.
And then I mixed them all together with my finger and… I didn’t like it.
But I liked the darker reddish pink color towards the bottom. So I decided to mix all the colors randomly and see what comes out. So I started again, this time randomly distributing the colors (no black this time) across the lamp base.
And this time when I mixed them all together, I was absolutely thrilled. It had such a beautiful, rich and organic look. Here is a comparison of the spray painted lamp on the right and the pastel covered lamp on the left.
I very carefully moved it into the entryway to see how it looked compared to the mural. It was perfect. But of course at this point the base couldn’t be touched without the pastels peeling off on my hands. So I knew they had to be sealed.
But I absolutely loved the rich, organic look of the pastels.
The top was still taped so the lampshade didn’t fit properly. But I balanced it as carefully as possible to get an idea of what the finished lamp would look like. It was perfect.
And then I made a big mistake. Luckily I think it worked, but I learned an important lesson for the next time I want to use pastels. Instead of doing a quick Google search to figure out how to properly seal pastel shades (pastel shades require you to use a special setting spray), I grabbed my Rust-Oleum matte finish clear coat and sprayed the lamp base. I knew immediately that I had made a mistake. Once the spray hit the pastels, the pastels became much darker. But I had already started, so I had to commit and do the whole thing. I was hoping it would get lighter as it dried, but that wasn’t the case. Luckily I also really like the darker color. So I decided to just join in. It still has the organic, imperfect look that I liked before spraying the clear coat, but I liked it better before the clear coat.
But overall I really like how they turned out. And now I know for next time I need to get a special pastel sealing spray.
I’m still working on the lampshade issue. The original color of the lampshades was far too stark white for this area. I tried dyeing this one with tea, but it ended up with streaks. I’m not sure what caused the streaking, unless it’s the glue used to attach the fabric to the back that is preventing the tea stain from penetrating evenly through the fabric. I like how the tea stain toned down the white, but I can’t live with the streaks so I’ll have to find another solution.
However, I think the color is spot on with the tea stains. Here’s a look at the tea-stained shade with the original white shade. There’s not much darker, but it’s just enough to make a difference.
But I love these lamp bases. I think the color is just right. I really love the more organic look versus the sprayed look. And I think the color turned out just right, even though it ended up darker than I planned.
Now that I’ve made the decisions on lamps and console tables, I’m hoping to finish this area over the weekend so I can move on to the next project.
