http://www.littlehouseinthebigd.com/2012/03/spring-time-storage.html
Super cute, super easy, and inexpensive too. What's not to love?
I scoured Craigslist for about a week until I found a metal filing cabinet close enough to my house to make the trip for. I paid $15 dollars for it. I went to Hobby Lobby to find the spray paint, which was on sale for 40% off. Score! I bought 1 can of primer and 2 cans in the color I wanted. I already had fabric to use from there that was originally destined for another project that I decided not to do. The original Pinterest inspiration used scrapbook paper, so if you choose to do this project just know that either is fine to use. I have a Cricut cover in the same pattern and had decorated a waste basket for my office using it as well. I really need to use a coordinating pattern for some curtains I think but that's a whole other project though!
So my materials for this project are...
1 can primer
2 cans spray paint
1 jar of Modge Podge
Fabric
Metal filing cabinet that is in need of a makeover
I wiped down the filing cabinet with my homemade lemon vinegar cleaner first. If the filing cabinet had been scratched at all, it would have required a good sanding first. Luckily, it was in good condition and I could skip that step. I removed the drawers and pulled the rest of the cabinet outside to prime. Since I was covering the drawers with fabric, there wasn't a need to paint them. It was 92 degrees outside today and the paint was drying almost instantly. The spray paint clearly states that the best conditions to paint is between 50-90 degrees. I like to live on the wild side though and decided to ignore the paint can warnings.
It took two coats of the primer to really cover the black enough to move on to the colored spray paint. Here is the cabinet after one coat of the primer. It had better paint coverage after the second coat, but I forgot to snap a picture after the second coat so you will have to use your imagination here for how it looked after that last coat.
The color spray paint I used was called Bauhaus Gold by Krylon. My office is colorful and this should work nicely with everything in there. Here is the cabinet after it's first coat. Fun and sunny right?
It took 4 coats to finish, which was exactly what my two cans of paint had in them.
Next step in the filing cabinet makeover was to Modge Podge my fabric to the drawers. The Hubby removed the hardware from the drawer fronts. I did two coats over top of the fabric, allowing a few hours between each coat so I was sure it was dry.
We reattached the hardware and my filing cabinet was looking better than it ever had before! I will admit, I had been worried that the drawers would stick because of the Modge Podge, but they work just as well as before.
Ahhh! It is so cute right?
Great job! I'm working on a file cabinet this week. =)
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