I found this vanity, old, beat up and having seen better days. But I had a flashback to this pair of nightstands I did in the spring, and I wanted to do it again! There’s something about a good pair of vintage nightstands that is just so good. These are taller too which is perfect to sit next to a modern bed, and the narrow dimensions mean they will fit just about anywhere.
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Demo
First up was a bit of demo – it can be a little tricky to figure out how an old piece is put together, so I took all the drawers out and looked for a clue. There were a couple of screws and a couple of nails holding it all together, so I just took them out one by one.
I cut the vanity in two with my reciprocal saw – let me tell you, it’s pretty fun to cut a piece of furniture apart with a saw like that! What I didn’t realize (duh) was that each side only had 3 legs, so as soon as I cut the piece apart it just fell over.
You’d think I would have noticed that when I bought the piece, but I was so excited about it – the number of legs escaped me. Ha!
When I was out of obvious things to take apart, I grabbed my hammer and started prying the pieces off one by one. Once the pieces were apart, I built a new leg using 1×2’s and filled all the holes and gaps with Bondo Wood filler.
Time to Finish
Once the prep work was done, the wood filler was sanded and everything was standing on it’s own, it was time to finish it!
The tops were really pretty pieces of wood, so those got sanded down to raw wood and stained with Walnut wood stain. Then finishes off with General Finishes High Performance Topcoat in flat.
The bases of these were feeling more masculine to me, and I wanted to keep them nice and neutral, so I pulled out Coastal Blue. I think it was the perfect choice for this pair of vintage nightstands, don’t you?
A little distressing to set off the details, and a quick coat of High Performance topcoat in flat finish to give these just a nice finishing shine. The hardware was all there and I thought it was perfect, so I used the original pulls after they were cleaned up a bit.
I love old vanities turned into nightstands, I think they are just the perfect size and shape to sit on either side of a bed. I’ll be on the hunt for more for sure!
This vintage pair will be coming with me to Kinsey Vintage Market at the end of the month! I’m so excited, I can hardly wait – tons of fun stuff coming your way. If you are local to the Western PA area, mark your calendars now!!
Until next time,
Jenni
