New Project

So I've had this old white desk for a few years now that my cousin gave me when I needed furniture after moving into an apartment by myself. It had been sloppily painted white, with ugly red knobs on the drawers, but I kept imaging how pretty it would be if I stripped it down and stained or repainted it. Here I am almost 3 years later and I've finally decided to tackle this project.

I've been thinking about painting it black. I think black furniture in a bedroom would look really great, plus black is easy to incorporate a color scheme around. I bought this stuff called Klean-Strip Stripper. Its in an aerosol can and you spray it really thick over the painted surface and it bubbles the paint up, then you can scraped it off smoothly. Pretty cool stuff. It took my 3 full coats on my three drawers to get even close to the bottom.

First was the sloppy, thick white paint. Next was an awful pink coat. Then there was a tan layer. Then green, then black, then the wood. I couldn't believe how many times it had been painted. By the time I scraped/sanded off any thick paint, I was left with something I'm not quite sure how I feel about.

It looks like it was painted black, sanded down smooth, then painted green, sanded down smooth, then painted tan. So the stripper isn't eating off the black and green. But when I sand it by hand, its giving it an antiqued look that I am falling in love with. The picture doesn't do it justice - its blurry and looks yellow. But imagine an old chalkboard thats greyed and no longer black. Thats the underneath color. Then this gorgeous green I would imagine as a color of some bird's egg, like a pastel baby green. Together, they are beautiful. I'm imagining it in a big open kitchen, with silver knobs. Maybe I'll paint the desk a slate color and keep the drawers the slate/green. I don't know, but this project is completely different than when it started.

I haven't made any sure decisions yet. I'm going to finish up the final drawer, and do the desk, and survey what I have at hand. I'm thinking about getting silver knobs very soon...like today...because I can't NOT use the desk for the weeks its going to be before I get the whole thing finished, but I can't stand the way those stupid red handles look. Any ideas? Black knobs? Silver? White? Black desk? Desk matching the drawers? I have too many options!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm feeling overwhelmed.