Screen-In front porchOk, so this is was the porch looked like (minus the furniture, thats the previous owners stuff). It was completely white with a dark teal trim around the middle?? What did teal have to do with anything else in or out of the house I have no idea but it was time to go. The front door also had a big window on it, lovely yes, but kinda eliminates privacy, and as you see it was white too.
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The door though small was a bit harder. The natural wood was painted, meaning it wasn't finished in polyurethane and then painted. So that made a lot more work. When the paint was removed I still had to take steel wool and acetone to get the door clean. There was paint in the wood grain. When it was all clean I used some Minwax Polyshades in Expresso with a satin finish on both sides. Installing a curtain isn't my style for such a casual door, so I researched and found at Lowes window film large enough for the glass (2ft x 3ft wasn't big enough). Its sticky not clingy so it was a pain to put up, but I like the end results all the same.
Let's not forget this neglected ceiling fan. Yes something else that is white, sheesh. I know most would have got with a brushed nickel, but this an old house and the doors knobs and plates are brass, the doorbell is brass, so anything silver in color just wouldn't work. Why brown, well a nice contrast to the white ceiling. Rust-oleum makes a great spray paint, one can painted two nice opaque coats on the fan, taking it from white and rusty to expresso.
Just took up the porch astro turf, so next summer I'll use some textured porch pain to cover it. It's so gross and powdery from old glue and patches of red, from red porch carpet? Cleaning this will be interesting.
I felt it needed a little more color than just tan, white and brown, so I opted for blue. Found a nice old antique brass lamp at the Thrift, recovered the shade and then made a few pillows. Oh and got a rug to help me decide weather I wanted to paint the floor blue or brown.
I bought both sets for more than half off mid summer. So I spent right at $200 for bistro set and love seat and table set. Made a few more pillows. Still need to recover the green, but I'll get around to that eventually, I have the main thing and thats good for now.
To strip all that old glue off, I used acetone and a long handled wire brush with a scrapper at the end. After pouring the acetone on a left if for a few minutes and then started scrapping. I left the piles of goo there and let the acetone dry out and then it flaked up when I rubbed my shoes over it. Then sweep. Then paint. (Side note: I did use stripper in one section which was quicker than acetone but you have the get the goo up before it dries, if you let it dry it turns into a hard lump of goo and hard to get up.)