Ikea Hemnes Dresser + A Racecar Stripe

**Addendum: See the complete(ish) bedroom makeover here.**

Question: "Can you paint Ikea furniture?" Answer: Yes!
And what's more, you can do a relatively simple upgrade with big-time impact. Paint furniture, then paint stripes to create a two-thumbs-up Racecar Stripe Painted Dresser. Great for a boy bedroom (at least for the boy at my house), and inexpensive to do.

 

 

Here's what I did: Take your furniture...

 ...and pull out all drawers, then remove all hardware. Lightly sand all surfaces to be painted with 220-grit sandpaper. (I know everyone hates sanding. It doesn't take long, though, to just rough up the surface a bit, and the paint job will be so much better in the ened. I'd recommend it.) You don't want to scratch the laminate, but you want to give your primer every possible chance of adhering to the surface.

 

Prime with 1-2-3 Zinsser primer. One or two coats, and sand any obvious areas. Then pull out your oil paint and spread on your first coat. A few things I noticed:

(1) This was my first time using oil based paint. I used Rustoleum's Aluminum oil paint (premixed, from Home Depot). Everything I read prior to painting talked about thinning out your oil-based paint before painting with it, but in this case, my paint was as thin as thin could be. Seriously. Like water. There was a massive glob at the bottom of the can when I first opened it, so I spent quite a long time stirring to break that up. The glob finally did go away/dissolve, but the paint was still very thin.

 

(2) A high quality paintbrush is the way to go. Not a cheapo brush, not a foam brush, not a roller. And it worked best for me when I just applied the paint and left it alone to dry.

 

 

(3) Let each coat dry com.plete.ly. Like, at least 24 hours. At least.

 

 

(4) I ran out of 220-grit sandpaper (which is pretty fine), so before my 2nd coat of paint, I used the finest grit I had. I'm not sure what number it actually was, but using it was a HUGE mistake. Totally scratched the paint rather than sanded it smooth. Then, like a rookie (and a lazy one at that), I thought that I didn't want to re-sand everything again, so *maybe* if I just painted over the scratches, the new coat of oil paint would fill them in. Nope. Let the record show that oil based paint is pretty much the same as latex paint - what you see in smoothness along the way is what you'll get at the end.

 

 

Crap. But it was a good lesson for me, if nothing else (kind of like how this experience was a good lesson in the importance of priming). So I bought the right sandpaper and came home and resanded everything down to the laminate. Basically, I started over. Which was a huge pain, as I'm sure you can imagine. But the finish ended up perfectly smooth. Yessss!

 

Taped out the stripes with frog tape (my new heart-throb of painters tape), painted two coats of blue latex stripes, and applied a topcoat of polyurethane. If you do a furniture painting project like this involving multiple coats and multiple colors, please please please promise me you won't rush it. In one sentence (above), I summarized about 4 days' worth of work and wait.

All in all, the project took me about 6 days (2-3 were due to my mistake. Oops.). Don't be overanxious, and do let the paint dry absolutely thoroughly between coats. I can't stress this enough. If you don't, and you paint on top of a mostly (but not completely) dry surface, it will be forever tacky when you put stuff on the furniture.

 

 

We really really like the finished result. And that oil paint? I'm a believer. My kids aren't exactly easy on furniture, and this paint job is actually standing up to them.

 

 

I like the impact of the stripe - a little retro, a little boyish, a little detail awesomeness that goes a long way. Plus, bonus, it was super simple to measure out (just four strips of frog tape) and paint. 

 

 

Anyone ever painted with oil based paints that were super duper thin before? Or have yours been thick (like all the places I've read) and needed thinning?

 

Either way: I like this look in my son's bedroom. And so does he. Victory all around.

If you're interested, feel free to check out the rest of his simple yet effective bedroom upgrade.

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