Found: Cane back arm chair
Where: Calmly sitting on the parkway north on Sheridan Road.  Had it a thumb on one of its two arms, it would have been out and visible.

The Makeover: Much trial and error was needed to arrive at the final finish, which is a turquoise undercoat with a blue metallic paint on top.

I started by sanding the chair, hoping to find a light wood that looks good in its natural state. The piece had been painted and varnished a few times in its lifetime of seating, and underneath were lots of dark spots and mismatched parts.

Plan B, by process of elimination, was paint—but what color?  From the basement shelf, the graveyard of leftover paint cans, I chose two that would be complement the fabric for the seat cushion.  I primed the chair with a tan satin, also from the graveyard.

Does anyone else have an issue with brown painted furniture?  If you want brown, you might as well use stain.  I tried the brown paint anyway, adding a glaze of bronze metallic over it.

I decided on this combination. I brushed on a coat of Behr’s Seven Lakes, a turquoise satin.  When dry, I did a dry brush of Palace Silver by Ralph Lauren.  Dry brushing makes it easy to control the amount of color you want as a top coat.  You dip just a quarter inch of the paint brush into the paint, then take a rag and wipe the paint off.  Do a test swipe on your drop cloth to find out how much paint is left on the brush.  When there’s next to none, use your brush to pounce it on the item you’re painting.

As a final step, I rubbed the surface with #0000 steel wool. This softens the brush strokes and makes color the most important element in the finish.

Materials: Yard of fabric from Calico Corners, bits of orange velveteen and green silk for the cording, down pillow form for the small back pillow, Behr Seven Lakes satin paint, Ralph Lauren Palace Silver metallic paint