In praise of Chalk (paint!)

Hi guys.
I hope you are well.
I thought I'd share a different project with you today. A project my wife and I tackled a while back.
We used DecoArt Chalky Finish paint to alter a pine dresser.
What is really great about this paint is that there is no need for extensive prep work, no sanding, no primer. It just goes straight on!

 First coat and the icky orange disappears...... We started off with a dark colour.

 Once that had dried we began to add layers of lighter colours. Using pale greens and blues to add tonal variation  Once everything was dry it was time to distress. Using sandpaper we sanded back to reveal the colours underneath. When we were happy with the distress it looked fab but still it looked too new for me so I hauled out my "Secret Weapon" A mix of bitumen and white spirit  and as my wife looked on in horror proceeded to "ruin" all our hard work.

 Have a little faith I said......... I then used a LOT of cloths and white spirit to rub back and remove the mix. The end result is a beautifully aged piece of furniture. The bitumen highlighted all the distressed areas, It sits in the nooks and crannies and gives all the colours a beautiful patina.

 Then the fun part was to fill it again,

No more icky orange, thanks to DecoArt.

Hope you like it, I'm off to the studio now, I have a book to make............