Just because you can only afford secondhand furnishings does not mean your home cannot express your personal style. There are many ways you can give new life to thrifted or hand-me-down pieces so your home is a reflection of you. I spent an hour or two painting a basic wood-framed mirror to give it a weathered, beachy look that is perfectly suited for an airy, bright room.
You can find mirrors at thrift stores and yard sales, or you can pick up an inexpensive mirror at a big-box store for $10 to $15.
First, you will need to run a line of painter’s tape where the glass of the mirror meets the frame. This is to protect the glass from paint mess. If you do accidentally get paint on the glass, do not panic! We will deal with that later.
I used three light colors of chalky-finish paint to makeover this mirror frame. I happened to have the larger-size paint jars on hand, but you will need very little paint for this project. You could easily get away with buying the 2-ounce bottles of paint and save yourself some money.
Apply the chalky-finish paint with a standard paintbrush. I chose a pure white paint as my base color. After the first coat has dried, add a second coat in a second chalky-finish paint color. My second color was a light grey. You do not have to be too precious with the application since the paint finish will be distressed anyway.
The easiest way to distress chalky-finish paint is by using the wet distressing technique. For this technique, you will have a 60-minute window of time in which it will work properly. Apply one coat of paint and let it dry for half an hour. Clean out your paintbrush and check out your Instagram feed or something. After the half-hour has passed, take a clean, damp cloth and rub it over the surface of the paint. The cloth will remove some of the paint wherever you rub it. Once the paint dries and cures, it becomes almost impossible to remove with just a wet cloth. That’s why that window between 30 and 90 minutes after painting is crucial.
You can see how well this technique works with just a damp cloth and a little elbow grease! After you have distressed the second layer of paint, you will want to rinse out your cloth so it is ready to use again.
I applied and distressed a third layer of paint, this time in a vintage grey/aqua color. After the final coat of paint has dried, you can peel off the painter’s tape. If any paint got onto the glass of the mirror, use a razor blade to carefully scrape the paint off the glass surface. Finally, use glass cleaner or rubbing alcohol to thoroughly clean the surface of the glass.
The mirror has such a pretty, weathered grey finish now. By keeping the three paints so close to each other in color, the mirror frame looks like paint that has naturally aged over time.
Not only does the frame have an airy beach appearance but having a mirror in a room makes the whole space look brighter and bigger.
Can you imagine how out of place that heavy wooden frame would have looked in this vignette? And for just a morning’s work, I had it completely transformed.
Speaking of which, take one final look at the before and after! Don’t live with furniture that doesn’t fit your style when it is this easy to give it a whole new look.