hello my furniture friends in this video i'm gonna bring you guys along with me as i take this
super outdated bench and give it a classy much more contemporary makeover
welcome or welcome back if you're new here my name is katie i am the k in salvaged by
k scott i'm a full-time furniture flipper now turned youtuber here sharing how i do
what i do to recycle repurpose and restyle worn out super tired pieces of furniture and hopefully
inspire you to look at your own furniture a little differently one of my husband's co-workers
was getting rid of this bench and asked if i would be interested in having it for a makeover
at first glance i was really turned off by the cushion this weird ledge and the fancy bottom trim
but i did see some serious potential in the clean traditional lines of the trim on the front
we're gonna go from country to contemporary on this one
i'm going to get started by getting rid of all of the stuff i don't like about this
piece i started off by removing any screws that i could find inside the
lid
i don't see any screws anywhere that would be holding this cushion on the top of the bench
i'm pretty sure it's glued on there so i went ahead and grabbed a pry bar and a hammer and
went at it sure enough it's held on by glue and a whole bunch of teeny tiny finishing nails
even though i removed all of the screws from this trim stuff it was still really stuck on there with
some glue so i grabbed my hammer and knocked them all out of the way now i can see quite clearly
that this is a really thin cheap maple veneer over particle board it's okay though this is nothing
i can't fix with a little bit of wood filler but first i took my pliers and removed all of
these tiny little nails i also want to take off this trim skirt so the same procedure i removed
any screws that i could see and then grabbed my hammer and knocked off anything that was in my way
one more flip right side up i'm going to remove all of the hardware off of the front of this piece
i'm not sure that i'm going to be replacing it either i think this
will look really nice with a clean simple front
next up i grabbed my five inch random orbital sander and some
80 grit sandpaper to start grinding off the thick puddles of glue that are stuck on the
top of this dresser and start smoothing out those areas where i have damaged the veneer
i forgot to clean it seriously this is step one of every flip i can't believe i forgot to clean first
i went ahead and gave the whole piece a good cleanup with some dixie bell white lightning
cleaner and hot water this is a tsp cleaner that is going to remove any dirt grease or grime from
the surface of the piece if you don't clean first you run the risk of grinding all of that stuff
down into the wood finish when you're sanding and that stuff stuck down in those wood fibers
can really impact your final finish next up i need to fix all of the damage that
i caused on the top of this chest and i'm going to use some bondo i get asked a lot
why bondo over wood filler and the short answer is it's a two-part epoxy filler product it's the
same stuff as this minwax high performance wood filler or even this other two-part epoxy putty
the nice thing about using bondo on pieces that are going to get painted
is it's a little bit less expensive the only downside is it's pink so if you're painting
it doesn't matter if you're going to be doing a stained finish or a bare wood finish and you want
your wood filler to blend into the natural wood color you want to go with a natural wood colored
filler does that make sense i hope that makes sense anyways just like any other two-part epoxy
filler i'm gonna mix the base putty with the cream hardener until i have a consistent color
throughout and then i'm just going to trowel it on over the damaged areas on the top you need to
be sure to work really quickly perfection is not necessary at this step you just want to get it on
because it does start to set up in about 10 to 15 minutes i didn't actually have enough bondo in my
stash to do all of the things i needed it to do so i grabbed some lighter weight wood filler to
fill in the old hardware holes and a couple of small nicks and dings on the front of this piece
this lighter weight filler is also a lot easier to sand so it's perfect for small tight areas
like filling in the gaps in the trim
once all my filler was dry i put on my respirator
and got to work sanding everything nice and smooth with some 80 grit sandpaper
and to get into these tighter trimmed out areas i grabbed my surf prep 3x4 electric gray sander
when i was done sanding i used some compressed air to blow away most of
the dust that i had created and then went over everything with a damp rag to pick up the rest
now it's time for primer i'm going to be using my favorite standard zinzer bin shellac base primer
i decided to spray it on this piece i'm really trying to get more comfortable spraying this
primer but if you don't have a sprayer you can definitely apply it with a roller
i do that all the time or you can even brush it you just need to remember that this is a shellac
based product so you cannot clean it with water you need to clean it with ammonia or denatured
alcohol before any water gets involved or else you'll end up with a giant sticky mess
i sprayed two coats of my primer over the whole piece let it dry for a few hours and then i came
back out to the garage late at night after everyone had gone to bed and gave the primer
a really quick sanding with a super fine sandpaper just to make sure it was silky smooth
the next morning i was ready to go in with my paint i'm going to be using dixie bells dried
sage on this this is a really thick chalk style paint so i went ahead and
added some water to get a good consistency for spraying and then added it into my gun
this is a complicated color you guys
it looks like a taupey beige color in the can but when i looked online for some inspiration pictures
it was green so i actually reached out to a couple of my dixie belle ambassador friends
and asked them is this dried sage color brown or green and i got mixed results in the answers
so it is called dried sage i would say it is a taupey beige color with heavy green undertones
i don't know when you see the final pictures at the end of the video you can be the judge
i ended up with perfect full coverage after two coats of paint i waited about two hours in between
my coats and i didn't need to sand in between coats or after the final coat because everything
dried nicely and that means it's time to move on to the next step which is sealing up our paint i'm
going to be using my all-time favorite verithane diamond wood finish in a satin sheen if you're in
the u.s this product looks very different on the shelves and is actually called verithine ultimate
water-based polyurethane just in case you're looking for it i sprayed a total of three coats of
this sealer over the painted piece and that should be plenty to hold up to regular wear and tear
now that all of my paint and top coat is dry on morning number three i am ready to move
on to the most terrifying process that i have ever put myself through for a furniture flip
i am going to be building my own new base for this chest i am not a carpenter i am not a woodworker
i am not good at any of this stuff at all i am following a tutorial by my friend andrea here
on youtube her channel is diy wife she has this go-to base that she adds to a ton of her furniture
it is incredible and she made it look easy enough for me to want to give it a try myself as per
andrea's tutorial which i will leave linked for you guys in a card up above here as well as in the
description box down below and i highly recommend that you go check out her video and her channel
is incredible anyways i'm using some red oak two by twos to create the four legs
that the chest will sit on and then some one by threes will be the frame in between
once i had everything measured out and cut down i was left with this i've got myself four legs
and four brace pieces to go in between and now it is time to figure out my brand new tool
the kreg jig this is an apparatus that helps you drill pocket holes so that you can screw together
two pieces of wood in a really inconspicuous manner i'm not going to give you guys any
instruction or advice on this other than read the instructions that's what i did i
got my tool out of the box i read through the instructions i figured it out and then
i went ahead and used one of my offcut pieces to play around with it and do some test holes
before i started trying to work on my actual good pieces of wood once i had the jig sorted
out i took a deep breath and started drilling two pocket holes on each end of the 1x3 brace pieces
do
and once i had all of my pocket holes drilled it was time to start
screwing the frames and the leg all
together
do ta-da i can't even articulate how proud of myself i am for pulling this off
i built this brand new furniture base out of wood all by myself and i still have all 10 fingers
anyways once i had everything put together i went over it with my sander just to make sure
everything was nice and smooth and also get rid of all of the lumber stickers from the hardware store
now because the little piece of trim on the bottom of this cedar chest is thin
it's not enough material for me to drill the new base into using more pocket holes so i went ahead
and grabbed the old brackets off of the old base re-glued them and stapled them onto my new base
and then i'll be able to just screw this right onto the bottom of the chest
just like the old base was attached again i hope that makes sense you'll see it in a second guys
i don't know i'm having a really hard time explaining things today
doug helped me bring the chest in and flip it upside down when he got home from work
so i was good to place my new base onto the bottom and screw it in
one more flip before we're all done the last step is just a little bit of dixie bells big
mama's butter on that natural bare red oak just to liven it up a little bit
what's on your mind
i see that you are struggling
on your own
i know that a lot of you guys are here for the financial stats the numbers involved
with furniture flipping so here is my breakdown my expenses on this piece included a little bit
of wood filler and sandpaper primer paint top coat and of course the new wood base all that lands me
right about 89 i'll also go ahead and show you guys kind of a rough labor break down here all
together i'm about four hours in on this piece so if this was a little bit higher quality of a
cedar chest and a name brand like lane furniture i would probably be listing a piece like this
in the 275 to 300 range but since this one is not a name brand a little bit lesser quality
i'm going to go ahead and market it at 250 that will leave me 161 dollars profit
which isn't breaking any sales records but still leaves me about 40 an hour to pay myself thank you
so much for hanging out with me again today please make sure that you are subscribed and have your
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and don't be afraid to share the channel or this video in particular with your friends or family
anyone that you think might be interested and i will catch you guys next time