Gray Jacobean Buffet

By Tammy Fiddie
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23 May, 2019
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Updated with metallic paint and glaze

Once in a while I post a picture of a piece of furniture on my Facebook page and ask everyone how they think it should be finished. Without fail, I will always get at least one person who will say, DON'T PAINT IT! I secretly always want to say to those people, "hello, you are following the page of a furniture painter!" LOL...but anyway, how can anyone possibly say they like the before picture better?! This piece absolutely came to life!

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When I posted the finished buffet on Facebook , I had a ton of people ask me about the products and colors I used. So I figured this was the perfect opportunity to do a blog post and have all of the info in one place. So here it goes.....

Picking The Right Shade Of Gray

This can be a difficult task......Sometimes the color straight out of the can isn't exactly what you are looking for. For me, gray's are especially difficult to find the right shade. Some are too blue or some have a purple undertone. I wanted a gray that didn't really look like anything, well, other than gray. LOL

I ended up trying General Finishes Lamp Black and General Finishes Chapin Gray. The thought was, I know the Lamp Black will go to the cool side (blues, purples) when lightened, but the Chapin Gray is on the warm side, so they should balance each other out, right?. That was the hope anyway! I added a little Lamp Black at a time to the Chapin Gray until I got the shade I wanted and it turned out just as I expect!

Once the piece was prepped and painted, I knew I wanted to add glaze to catch into the cracks and crevices to help show off the details. I decided to use General Finishes Pitch Black Glaze. I applied it with an inexpensive chip brush just to the areas that I wanted it and then wiped it back using a dry and/or wet lint free cloth.

Here is a pic after the glaze was applied but before the silver was added.

To Silver, Or Not To Silver....

So a lot of the time I don't have a full picture of what I want to do to a piece before I get started, and this was one of those pieces. Once I got to this point, with the glaze added, I had to stand back and look at it, walk away, and come back and look again and on and on....I finally decided that it did need something more, it wasn't spectacular enough!

I used Silver Leaf Rub N Buff on some of the details to make them pop a little more. (I always use my finger to apply.) This stuff is awesome and it goes a LONG way! I always buy the sample pack so I have a few colors to choose from.

The Top

When I first prep a piece like this, I usually always sand the top down to the bare wood to see what I have to work with, but I don't decide on a finish until the body is complete. For this one I used General Finishes Black Gel Stain. I know that might sound weird, especially since it looks brown! But I wanted it to be on the darker side and I didn't want any of the red/orange tones to come through that sometimes do on these tops.