Good karma must have come my way, because this bad boy came free…minus the updated look. Some lady posted this coffee table for free on Craigslist because of a small ding in the front middle.  Aaaand boom goes the dynamite.

Because of the chip in the wood, I needed to grab a small can of wood putty from a local hardware store.  Wood putty is great for covering up small blemishes on furniture.  After the putty fully dries, just sand it, and you’re ready to paint.

Depending on your home, coffee tables can experience a lot of use. Mine does, so I knew I wanted to give the paint a better head start in life with a bottom coat of all-purpose primer. So, this is where things got a little hairy (not literally hairy, but figuratively). I had this awesome can of free paint (see how I find paint for free here) that I was for sure planning to use. After all, I was going for a light, airy look, so the off-white color seemed perfect. Here’s where the figurative hair comes in: it totally didn’t work. While painting, I thought it seemed a little too white, but paint dries darker, so I thought it’d be perfect. It looked funky…in a bad way. Hence me going to the store to buy a pint of the perfect gray color. A couple coats of gray paint later, I was so glad I put in the few extra dollars. It still contributed well to the light and airy theme, and it wasn’t going to stick out like a sore thumb next to my blue couch.

The finishing touch on this coffee table was the drawer pulls. I loved how the original hardware looked independent of the coffee table, but the brown color just didn’t jive with the new gray. Problem? Nah! It’s called spray paint. A black coat did the trick, creating a beautiful contrast in color. (Side note: it’s okay to use accents of black in a light and airy themed design.)

The entire furniture piece cost about $10 to do. Nailed it!