From Orange Tone Wood to Summer-Ready Coastal Blue

Are you ready for summer and mornings by the water?  Whether you live by the ocean or not, you can lighten and brighten your home with seaside colors and decor to give you that airy,  summery feeling – and it’s so easy when you start with a simple furniture makeover.  Learn how I took this console table from orange tone wood to a summer-ready coastal blue.

Today’s console table was passed on to me from a my sister-in-law last summer and it’s been sitting in my stockpile since. The truth is, there were a thousand different ways I could go with refinishing this table and I couldn’t decide on the one.

No matter which finish I chose, I had to take the orange tone into account. The orange comes from a chemical change when the pine wood is exposed to sunlight. The orange tone may also be enhanced by whatever protective clear coat was used at the time.

If you’re not careful to remove the outer layer or seal it in with a good primer, this orange will bleed through a finish almost immediately

Lately, I’ve been trying to preserve natural wood more often than cover it with paint. So I opted to sand the table down entirely. Well, that was about 6 months ago. I still couldn’t decide what I wanted the table to look like.

I really wanted to go with a stain or maybe a bold or dark color, but the lines of this table kept revolting. Do you see those legs? Totally feminine. This table was begging for a light, soft, feminine finish.

And then it happened. Inspiration arrived in my inbox. Look at this gorgeous table from Denise at Salvaged Inspirations. It’s soft, feminine, and summery. Just perfect don’t you think?

I didn’t have that exact shade of blue in my stock of paints and have really been trying to use up what I have. But what I did have in my finished furniture supply was the leftover paint from these two Persian Blue mirrors.

Painted & Glazed Table Base

Just as Denise did with her table, I decided to paint the table base and stain the top. Here are the steps and the products used on the base:

• Paint on Zinsser primer
• Paint on General Finishes Persian Blue Milk Paint
• Apply General Finish Winter White Glaze
• Brush on a matte water-based clear coat, like Minwax Polycrylic

Stained & Blue Washed Top

The tabletop was stained. Stain is more durable than paint because it seeps into the wood rather than sits on top; so surface scratches aren’t as noticeable.

Four coats of Minwax Pickling Whitewash was applied with a clean cotton rag (aka t-shirt). This water-based stain dries in a fraction of the time of oil-based products, which means I could work quickly and apply four coats of stain over just two days. Yes, it took 4 coats to cover the pine knots.

But I wasn’t finished there. When I stepped back and looked at the white stained top and blue base there was more contrast than I wanted. The two needed to blend a little more. So I applied a very light blue wash to the top.

To apply a paint wash, mix 2 tablespoons of the Persian Blue paint with 2-3 tablespoons of water to make the paint really watery. Dip a clean cotton rag into the watery paint and wipe it across the tabletop. Use just a tiny bit of paint and spread that tiny amount across a large surface area.

The result…. a soft, cloudy, summery ocean blue that blends with the base, without matching perfectly.

The final step was to apply the matte Minwax Polycrylic to the tabletop.

This coastal blue console table is now for sale in Entri Ways’ online shop.

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links to products I use myself.