"Le vaisselier"

I have been wanting to change my dining room for a long time since the old, more modern, black and white style set I had was so boring. I had bought a huge china cabinet for our dining room from the Internet. I was excited but wondering what on earth am I getting myself into?

My first ever diy-project I've done was a few weeks ago. I transformed a TV-stand that I painted white and which is in my living room now. 

But now I had my first REAL project on my hands; a huge, wooden cabinet with spider webs! 

My husband thought all the time I was going to change it to another wood color and he was quite curious to see the result when I announced it to be white. 

So here it is the day we got it from a grange on the north side of Montreal area, here in Canada. It was beautiful as is but for me it didn't match like this, I needed to change the wood color.

Original cabinet colour

I was long time torn over my original idea of painting it white or saving it as a wood colour, only less orange. My hubby wished for the wood but I chose white so once again, I lifted my sleeves and started to work.

I removed all the hardware to notice that almost all of the hinges had a plastic part on them that were cracked. I decided to change everything on it, hinges and hardware. I also removed the old beautiful windows on the doors.

Here the vaissellier (=china cabinet) is, in all its raw beauty:

I sanded it down with my brand new DeWalt 1/4 sheet Palm Grip sander. I used only 120 grit paper since I was going to prime it after.
The sanding and cleaning took forever but luckily I had my mom over here from Finland so she helped me a lot. Thank you mom!
Then started the priming part which was surprisingly easy compared to my previous bubbling primer experience with my TV-stand.
The cabinet was smelling a bit murky but with a good layer of primer the smell got reduced. The primer I used was a Sico primer.
As you can see of the picture, I started in the corners and did all of them first with a normal paintbrush and after I filled in everything with a 6mm foam roll. The best would have been to do it a section at a time so that you wouldn't have been able to see the difference so clearly. Not that it matters because it's only a primer but I learned to do better job with the paint.

After primer...

I did all the work outside on our balcony because we do not have a garage (yet) and we had to bring it inside all the time because of unstable weather... rain, sun, rain, sun... NOT HEAVY at all!!!

I had bought a foam brush to finish the paint job instead of doing it with the brush. I am totally in love with the foam brushes and recommend them if you want to have a finish without brush streaks.
After 3 layers of paint I decided it was enough. I let it dry completely and after 2 days I finished it with Minwax paste finishing wax.

I am so proud of my transformation and even if it was a big job to do, I started a new project the next day...
Now this beautiful china cabinet really has gotten a second life as a more modern piece of furniture but still keeping it's ancient look.

My beautiful china cabinet!

Luckily I saved the old hardware because I start to bend towards them after all. I removed them because I thought they wouldn't fit my cabinet after I painted it white but I realize that they would give a more rustic charm to it. I can always use these new ones to another project... I'll put a picture of the new/old hardware so you can see how they are. Please, give me your opinion of what should I do? Keep the new or change back to the old?

Thank you again for reading and I'll post more transformations soon!
Have a good 4th of July my American sisters!
Ninja