I love spray paint. Especially glossy spray paint.
I have this black Bertoia side chair that I use as a desk chair. I bought it years ago from a cracked out lady at a “prop” warehouse in Los Angeles. I followed a mysterious Craigslist ad to a downtown warehouse FILLED with crap. For $30 I walked away with the chair and left the scabby, twitchy “prop” crew to sort through their stacks of junk.
Needless to say…the chair has seen better days. I decided to touch up its peeling matte black paint job with something a little sexy and glossy. And since my thrifted butterfly chair frame had also seen better days, I threw it in to get a touch up.
Here they are ready to get painted.
*Don’t make fun of my weedy dirty backyard. I know its HORRIBLE. Give me some money and I’ll fix it.
- I ran some sandpaper over the frames to knock off any bits of flaking paint or rust.
- Hosed them down to get all the dust and crap off.
- Let them air dry a bit.
- Then wiped them down with a clean towel.
You can imagine that right? I forgot to take pictures.
-Then I sprayed them with Rust-Oleum Professional High Performance Enamel in a glossy black finish.
All in all its a super duper simple DIY.
Here is the rusty bit BEFORE and the glossy bit AFTER.
I know. Super exciting.
All done. Painting something black more black isn’t really a huge AFTER reveal…they look much nicer in person than they did before.
The best option would be to have them powder coated – which is mucho $$$. Spray painting is a quick and easy DIY solution to touch up something vintage that has seen better days. Maybe if you fall in a big bag of money you could have them stripped and powder coated later.
I’ve been using a small sheepskin as a chair pad for the Bertoia chair. I need something a little more cushy as my bottom feels a bit like swiss cheese sitting on it for long hours in front of the computer. I also soaked the butterfly chair cover in bleach to try and get some of the stains out and lighten it up a bit. It worked OK, but it is still pretty torn and stained. I still dream of a brown leather sling…
For about $6 it turned out awesome.
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4 Comments
Looks great! I love how easily some spray paint can save the day. Too bad you can't buy it in Chicago and you have to haul yoursel out to the suburbs to get it.
You could try to use a high concentrated peroxyde to get more stains out of the cover and whiten it more, sometimes it works better than bleach.
Auto shops will paint cheaper than powder coating, and better than DIY glossy (icK) spray paint. They'll do anything.
I love powder coating but it is expensive, you're right. I like to go in on a batch with others – that can bring the price way down, if you can agree on a color with a friend.
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