Chris found me on craigslist a few weeks back and we have been e-mailing and chatting back and forth about refurbishing some of her own bedroom pieces. She found my red and white secretary on craigslist and nearly abandoned all of her decorating plans to buy it…despite the fact that the size and style wouldn’t work for her needs.

The existing pine wood bedroom dresser and nightstand in Chris’s room is going to refinished with black paint and distressed…shabby chic style. So, the desk for her bedroom needed to pop against the heavy, black pieces! We went back on forth on different color options bouncing between olive green and red. And, since she described her bedroom decor as having a lot of red accents, we settled on a red desk! Seeing as how Chris loved the secretary so much, I suggested we mimic that design on her desk. Antique red finish with antique glazed white drawers.  

I started with paint on the outside. There was beautiful wood grain throughout this piece of furniture, so I did my best to sand through some of the paint so that the original finish peeked through. Since I was adding an antique glaze over it, the peeking wood finish would blend rather than look like I missed some spots.

I painted the drawers a soft antique white.

The antique white is really bright against the rich red, but with a bit of distressing and glaze, they look amazing.

Can you tell which one has the antique glazing? (It’s the one on the left)

The original hardware went back on which looks great with the distressing. Though, I think she might add her own glass crystal knobs which will be added to the refinished black dresser and nightstand. The knobs will be the unifying element tying all of the different pieces of furniture together.