Ikea Hack: How to Update Your Furniture with Chalk Paint

Furniture is one of the first and most essential things in your house to make it a perfect house. Furniture can be defined as movable articles or accessories used to make a place suitable for living and working, such as tables, chairs, beds, cupboards, etc.

Do you know furniture is used to support human needs? That is why it must be durable, but no matter how much durable furniture you have, it is still fragile at that time. Getting older day by day makes your furniture kind of weak and uglier?

If you ever dreamed of updating your old furniture, if you did, then you know a painting is one of the best ways to update your furniture. This article is about painting IKEA Furniture hemnes, and we will tell you all about how to do it, but moving further, we will tell you what chalk paint is and what material you need for painting IKEA furniture hemnes.

What Exactly Chalk Paint Is?

What Exactly Chalk Paint Is

You know furniture paint comes in several varieties, and it varies based on its uses and features. Chalk paint is one of them. Chalk paint is a decorative paint that is ideal for furniture. Well, it is an exclusive furniture paint that creates a chalkboard-like coating to give your furniture a fantastic look.

Annie Sloan’s paint brand created it, and when Annie Sloan first introduced chalk paint, it became the first official chalk paint manufacturing company. Chalk paint was created to reduce depending on efforts. Hence, it rarely requires much preparation, such as priming, sanding, cleaning, etc.

Generally, it is an easy-to-use and reliable furniture paint, and you can use it indoors and outside; it is not waterproof paint, but that does not make it unusable or idle for outside.

Materials You’ll Need for Painting IKEA Furniture Hemnes

Materials You'll Need for Painting IKEA Furniture Hemnes

We had told you before that chalk paint was specially created to reduce your painting efforts. Hence, it does not require much preparation, such as sanding, priming, Etc. But remember if you are updating your old furniture or painting your old IKEA furniture hemnes, you must do a lot of preparation and need various materials to succeed. Here we are going to and list down every material you will need for painting IKEA furniture hemnes.

  • Sandpaper or hand sander.
  • If your furniture has holes, then you will need wood filler to fill the holes.
  • Wood filigree if you want extra decoration.
  • Tack cloth or anything else to remove dirt.
  • Wood glue to paste wood filigree.
  • Chalk paint.
  • Creme wax.
  • Chalk paintbrush.
  • Soft cloth to wipe after wax rub.
  • New knobs for hemnes if you wanted to change old ones.

Now, we are going to state a complete process of painting IKEA furniture hemnes.

Step 1: Prepare the Furniture

The very first step in the process of painting IKEA furniture hemnes is preparing the furniture. If you are updating your old IKEA hemnes, this will not be easy for you because it requires a lot of effort to prepare for the chalk paint. First, you must start with removing the knobs off drawers and dressers.

Then, you must move towards breaking the old paint layer, i.e., you must sand off the old paint layer to apply the new one. If you did break the old paint’s layer, new paint could be applied nicely and offer a fantastic texture.

You know sanding is not an easy process. It takes a lot of human effort. Either you can use a hand sander or sandpaper to sand off the old paint layer, but I prefer you to use both because you will need both.

Some portion of your IKEA furniture hemnes is not easy to get covered by hand Sander, so you will need sandpaper to do so. First, you must go with a hand sander and then go with the sandpaper for the left area to remove the paint layer.

Step 2: Fill Up the Holes

After sending the furniture, you may get to see many holes and bloated portions on the furniture surface, so fill up the holes and get rid of the bloated area is one of your first needs to get your IKEA furniture hemnes painted successfully.

If your furniture has a bloated portion, then the first thing you must do is break that portion, making a tiny hole. After that, all you have to do is to fill up the holes. There are plenty of ways to fill up the holes but using wood filler is one of the most common and easiest ways to fill wooden holes.

To fill the holes of your IKEA furniture hemnes, you must buy a wood filler of any reliable brand to fill the wooden holes. It would help if you did is pour some wood filler into the holes, make sure that the hole is filled up with wood filler completely, and then wipe out the top with any plastic or metallic plate. Keep it aside to get dry, as, as the result of this drying session, your furniture’s holes get filled.

Step 3: Clean the Furniture

As you have done sanding to break the old paint layer and fill up the wooden holes, the next step is to remove the dirt off from the furniture and clean it thoroughly to move further. One of the best ways to clean the furniture is using tack cloth because tack cloth was specially designed to pick up all the dust and dirt particles from the surface.

A tack cloth is a soft piece of reticulated cloth with linseed oil on it, making it efficient in terms of dust cleaning. As you already noticed, while sanding off the old paint layer, there was so much dust produced, no matter how well you wiped out your furniture; to apply paint or add would applique, you have to clean it with a tack cloth. To clean furniture, you must cut or take a small piece of tack cloth and rub the furniture slowly. It can easily remove tiny dirt particles.

Step 4: Add Wood Appliques

Add Wood Appliques

There are plenty of items that you can apply to your old IKEA furniture hemnes while painting them to provide a new look to your furniture, and applying wood appliques is one of them. Wood appliques are hand-made wooden plates with the face of the leaf, flowers, petals, etc.

Wood appliques are easy to add to the furniture, it has a decorated face and plain back, and it is used to be applied by attaching its back to the furniture. When you prepare your furniture for paint and do all the cleaning, that is the right time to add wood appliques to it.

The best way to add wood appliques to the furniture is using wood glue. All you must do is apply a little layer of wood glue on the back of your wood appliques and put that wherever you wanted on your IKEA furniture hemnes.

Step 5: Add the First Layer of Chalk Paint

After adding wood appliques, your furniture hemnes is entirely ready to get the first layer of paint. Chalk paint drips less than regular paints, and it also dries fast than regular paints, so you must move your hand quite faster.

When you are painting your furniture and want a simple texture, keep in mind you must stroke just in one direction, but you want a messy texture, then you can stroke in several directions.

While painting, if you see any spot or rough particle, then go back, remove or press them, and then apply paint again. Just in the same way, go for the drawers. When you did apply the first layer of paint, then let it dry.

Step 6: Use Candles to Highlight Spots

Use Candles to Highlight Spots

Using candles to make some highlighted spots is very easy; if you wanted to do so, this step is only for you. When you rub a white candle on your furniture’s hemmer’s surface, it creates a skinny layer, and when you apply paint on it, it makes the surface a little patchy.

Any place you wanted to make highlighted or wanted your base color to show off, then rub the white candle over it. People used to highlight the edges and corners of their hemnes, so they rub the candle on the edges and corners to highlight them. The thicker you make the wax layer, the more you can remove paint, so wherever you wanted your base color to show off, apply wax there.

Step 7: Add the Top Layer of Paint

After applying the wax layer to make patchy spots, the next thing you got to do is apply the paint’s topmost layer. Chalk paint dries fast, so you do not have to wait for so long to get the first layer dry that means the time you get to wait is a maximum of 30 mins.

To apply the top layer of paint, you must use a chalk paintbrush of acceptable quality to get a good texture. Remember one thing, and when you are applying a paint layer on the top of the hemnes, you must stroke in just one way because the top will look ugly if you make a messy layer of paint.

Step 8: Sand Again

When you realize that the second or top layer of your paint is dried, then this is the time to sand again. This sanding session is needed to remove the way you applied earlier, so to do so, you will need high grit sandpaper, or you can use a wet piece of paper towel. Remember one thing, and you are doing this to make your base paint show off, so you do not have to rub so hardly; make gentle strokes, and after every rub, wipe out the chalky powder.

Step 9: Wax on And Wax Off

Now, you have done all the painting so we will tell you how to add more strength to your chalk paint layer so it cannot be scrapped or removed accidentally, and this is the last but not the least important step of painting IKEA furniture hemnes. The chalk paint wax comes in different colors but clear white on of the most usable of them.

To add the resistance against the accidentally scrapped, you must apply a skinny layer of chalk paint wax to your furniture. All you must do is dip your brush in the chalk paint or pour some on the surface, then make a thin layer of it by using the brush, and then wipe it off. It is used to add more strength to the top paint layer, so you must apply a thin layer wipe it off with a soft piece of dry cloth.

Step 10: Buff the Furniture and Add Knobs

After adding the wax and wipe it off, the last thing you get to be buffing your furniture. It can be done by either using lubricant or without it. All you must do is take a piece of a soft cloth and rub the surface very smooth. When you are done buffing, adding the knobs is the last barrier for enjoying your new IKEA furniture hemnes. So, add the knobs to your hemnes, and then your new furniture is ready to use.

Conclusion

Here we have stated a complete process of painting IKEA furniture hemnes by using chalk paint. If you find this article helpful, then kindly share your thoughts with us.

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