We love nothing more than salvaging an old, worn piece of furniture and giving it a whole new life with some paint or stain. Not only does it keep the piece out of the land fill, but you end up with a one of a kind piece that has more character than anything you can buy in a store today. As much as we want to give our pieces a modern update, we often want to keep, or add, a slightly aged or distressed feel to a piece. Here are 5 ways you can age or distress already painted furniture:
This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our Disclosure Policy for more details.
1. Distress with sandpaper
This technique is really as easy as it sounds. Once you’ve painted your piece in the color of your choice, take a fine or medium grit sandpaper and lightly sand the surface in areas where natural ware would occur (edges and corners). Avoid the temptation to sand the flat middle bits or the piece tends to look overly worked and artificial.
2. Removing paint layers
If you are fortunate enough to have a piece that has multiple coats of paint already on it, you might want to consider removing some layers to reveal the coat(s) or wood surface underneath. Time to experiment! Try sanding and see what you can reveal below. If this isn’t as dramatic a look as you want, you can apply a paint stripper to soften the top layers and scrap or wipe off paint in some key areas.
If you don’t have paint layers to work with already, you can add your own – and then remove them. This is a great way to add a dramatic color without having it become overwhelming.
3. Dry brush to distress already painted furniture
Another way to age a piece of furniture is to use a “dry” brush – a brush with a very small amount of paint on it – to apply another color coat. The goal is to keep this coat very light and uneven across the piece. Typically the color to be dry brushed is lighter than the basecoat. This is a great technique for achieving that beachy look which is popular these days.
A good quality paint brush, such as these, will help the paint not to come off too patchy and give you a more even, weathered look.
4. Whitewash to age painted furniture
Whitewashing is similar to dry brushing. Both involve applying a top coat in a way to allow the base coat underneath to show through. To apply a whitewash, add water to paint. Yep, it’s that easy! You can start with equal amounts of paint and water. After brushing the mixture on, wipe it off gently with a damp cloth. You can repeat this process until you get the desired look. You can read more about colour washing here.
5. Wax or glaze to distress already painted furniture
You can also use a dark wax or glaze to age a painted wood piece. This technique is especially effective on pieces that have a lot of little details you want to bring attention to.
Wax can be applied with a brush or a rag. The role of the dark wax in this application is to give the piece some age, not act as a protective coat. We therefore recommend sealing the piece first, either with a polycrylic coat or clear wax. Apply the wax all over the piece, working in small sections at a time. Spread it on, wait a couple minutes and wipe it off with a lint free cloth. If you’ve waited too long and the wax isn’t wiping off (maybe you’re like us and you try and fill those couple minutes with laundry, loading the dishwasher and a couple minutes turns into 10 or 15 minutes), just add more wax on top and it should wipe off.
Similarly, you can apply the glaze with a rag or brush. Leave it on for a few minutes (until it starts to look a little dull) and then wipe it off with a lint free cloth.
These are just 5 ways you can age or distress already painted furniture. And, of course, you can combine them to create all kinds of aged goodness. There are other techniques, but these are the ones we have tried with some success. Don’t over do it! There is nothing less attractive than an overly distressed piece. Personally, we try and keep our aging and distressing to a minimum. I sometimes admire a good chippy piece, but it’s not really our aesthetic.
How about you? Which techniques give you the best results? We’d love for you to let us know how you distress wood furniture and leave your comment below.
Leave a Reply