Hands down teal is my favorite color. BUT every time I think of the word teal, the line from The Wedding Planner always plays in my head: “Teal, the color of gangrene.” This is how Jennifer Lopez describes her distaste for the color of teal in the movie. Needless to say, this hasn’t stopped me from swooning over the color teal. I mean my high school senior prom dress was teal, and I have two rooms painted two different shades of teal in my house (more on those later).

About a year ago I took a class to learn some different techniques to use the Annie Sloan Chalk Paint. I blogged about my experience, here. This was the first time I worked with the color Provence. It’s a muted teal color (especially when compared to her other teal, Florence) and I knew I wanted to use it on some piece of furniture. I talked about the difficulty I have committing to paint color here. I find it easier to commit to a neutral color than to a red, blue, green, etc. I’ve only refurbished pieces of furniture in neutral colors. I’ve been scared to pick other colors because I want the piece to be versatile and I don’t want to refurbish the same piece of furniture twice.

Choosing Provence for my kitchen table was an easy and natural choice. My kitchen is a light gray and the cabinets are a dark espresso color. There are also hints of teal, green, and blue in my curtains in the kitchen. The color wasn’t going to be overwhelming either. I only planned to paint the table apron and the pedestal and I was going to restain the table top.

I started working on this table at the beginning of April. My friends gifted me the table after they decided to renovate their kitchen and get a new table. It has good bones. I wasn’t a fan of the orange looking stain on the wood, but that could be fixed. Here are some before shots of the table:

I started sanding down the top with 60 grit paper and my sander. I received a new sander for Christmas and this was the first project I used it on. After removing all of the lacquer, I sanded by hand to get a smooth finish. I tapered the grit of the sand paper I used: 150>200>325>400. Once it was all smooth, I wiped everything down with a tack cloth.

I re-stained the top with Minwax’s Dark Walnut, which is the same color I used on my parent’s kitchen table here. Dark Walnut is my favorite stain color. I ended up needing three coats of stain to achieve the final look. I use old t-shirts to apply wood stain. In one hand I have the cloth that applies the stain and in the other is the dry cloth that wipes away the stain. I usually work in a small area, maybe 6”X6” and apply the stain to the entire area and then immediately wipe it off. It is much easier to add coats of stain, but if you leave it on there too long and it gets too dark, it is hard to make it lighter again.

After the table top was finished, I moved on to painting the apron and the pedestal. It took about 3 coats of paint to cover it all. I let it dry for a couple of days and brought it inside to harden. Next I put a poly on the table top to seal it. When I refurbished my parents table we used the Annie Sloan Clear Wax on the table top. Now that they’ve used it for 6 months, they would have preferred a poly sealer. The wax seems to still leave streaks on the table top, if you touch it. I decided to use a satin finish polycrylic for the table top. This is the one I ordered, here. I’ve used the high gloss version before, but I wanted a sealer without a super shiny finish. I applied 3 coats to the table top. I used the Annie Sloan Clear Wax on the table apron and pedestal (three coats as well). I let the wax dry for 24 hours after the last coat and then buffed it for a little bit of shine.

Here is the final product in my kitchen. I really like the teal; it’s a nice pop of color in the room.

You may be wondering, where are the chairs for this table? Well I am having some difficulty in the chair department. I didn’t like the chairs that came with the table. I don’t like the style, nor are they super comfortable. Also, after refurbishing my parent’s kitchen table chairs, I have no desire to work on anymore chairs. I have been scouring the internet the last couple of months looking for chairs to go with this table. To be honest, I don’t know exactly what I am looking for. I am open to different options, and have continued to expand my options as I have continued to strike out. I thought I found a set of chairs and ordered these from Hayneedle, here. They appeared to be the perfect antique gray to complement both the room color and the table. They had a cottage feel to go with the table. Originally I didn’t want a seat with a fabric cushion, but I was willing to compromise on this element. Hayneedle was having a really good sale on these a couple of weeks ago, so I ordered 4 chairs. When I opened the box, I knew immediately they were not going to work. The antique gray had a lot of orange and green undertone in the paint. The seat cushion was also a tan color (it looked gray or white in the picture). I immediately taped the box up and sent them back. So for now, I’m taking a break on hunting chairs. I did snapped some pictures of the chairs.

Here are some nice before and after pictures side by side to see the full transformation!