industrial file cabinet makeover (part two)

Whee! I'm back with the follow up to my recent entry about the modern industrial makeover I gave this 1980s black + fake wood steel filing cabinet.

As you might recall, a few weeks ago I started cleaning my room, realized we needed a full-sized file cabinet instead of a bunch of file boxes, and got sidetracked from the room cleaning project while I finished making it over . . .

. . . into this bare steel industrial-style cabinet.  I don't mind having it in my house, even though it's full of boring papers and responsibility.

It's not just me, right? This is a little like when Eliza Dolittle turns out to be a stunner. (The rain in Spain is falling mainly on the plain, am I right?) Or like when Rachael Leigh Cook takes off the glasses and Freddie Prinze Jr. realizes she's Superman?

I really like the way this turned out.

When I last wrote about this cabinet, I'd stripped and sanded the main body and managed to get most of the paint off. I decided to keep the paint that remained after hours of palm sanding (aka: clanging and waking the neighbors) and I'm pretty happy about it. The black paint in the rivets, dents, and folds makes me happy.

Then I attached the casters, bought new from Harbor Freight on super sale. I had first searched the big bin o' casters at Bring and came up a couple short of a matching set, sadly. I like to check there first then follow up elsewhere. I don't always find what I need on the first try, but when I do, it's always worth the search.

I flipped the cabinet, exposing its rusty underside . . .

. . . and used the casters to mark where to drill the holes.

Once the holes were drilled and the filings swept away, I used three little bolts and three little nuts to attach each caster to the cabinet (the fourth hole won't fit on the frame).

And then, with all of the wheels attached, I flipped it upright and the easy part was done.

I say that because this next bit was kind of a trial.

I really wanted bare steel fronts until I started sanding the first drawer with the palm sander. It was slow, noisy work that reminded me (negatively) of sanding the cabinet (clangity clang clang!). I thought I might prime + chalkboard the drawer faces instead. And it was a bad idea.

I'd just finished removing all of that black paint from the rest of the cabinet and I didn't at all like it on the drawer fronts. The paintbrush marks didn't appeal to me, either, so I switched courses (after everything was painted, unfortunately) and decided to try sandblasting.

After a few days of waiting and gathering supplies, here's one attempt with the sandblaster + walnut shell media + 30 minutes. Look at how it's not even breaking through the original wood patterned paint. Awesome.

I switched to using sand as media and had an easier time of it, but really, our air compressor is just too wimpy for sandblasting.

I decided to try the orange paint stripper again and actually had pretty awesome luck with it. You can see here the less reflective (darker) areas where, after an hour or so of sandblasting, some of the paint came off. The lighter areas are where the paint stripper did it's thing, and then I did mine with a Scotch Brite pad, a sanding block, and some steel wool.

It took a bit of work to get the finish even, but only on this one drawer. The others hadn't been sandblasted yet when I moved on to paint stripper.

Handles were next! I shared a photo of seemingly random bits of metal hardware in the previous post; they weren't random after all, at it turns out. I used some of those pieces to make four new handles with the character I wanted.

I made the handles from some blank metal outlet plates and what I think were probably sliding screen door handles in a former life. This was my favorite part of this makeover, and the thing I think added the most to the piece. (I bought the light switch plates, too, unsure of which combination would work out. These cost between twenty-five and fifty cents at Bring, and I'll be able to find another use for them so I wasn't concerned about over-purchasing.)

I drilled holes through the old handles, using the blank outlet plates as templates. Little bolts and nuts joined them together to make a nice flat surface for the final piece.

After drilling one more hole and applying one more bolt per drawer, the handles are complete. When well-tightened, these don't shift or wiggle (possibly because the bolts underneath encourage them to stay in place).

Here it is, back in one piece, exuding awesomeness and making paperwork look a whole lot less 1980s-style boring.

This was a time-consuming project, but not outrageously expensive:

• filing cabinet: $11.25 on sale at St. Vincent dePaul
• handle parts: $5 or so, total, used from Bring
• casters: $4 total, on super sale at Harbor Freight for $1 each
• bolts + nuts: $5 or so, including bolts from Bring, nuts from the hardware store
• coarse sandpapers and sanding block: $6
• orange stripping gel spray: $9
• Scotch Brite pads: had on hand

Ultimately the sandblasting kit and media weren't necessary or useful for this project, so I'm leaving them off the materials list. In lieu of a powerful air compressor/sandblaster combination, what you really need to finish something like this is a whole mess of elbow grease.

Thanks for sticking with me through the many, many words and pictures! I'm really pleased with how it came out, in case you couldn't tell. Now I can start obsessing over something else on Pinterest.

Linking up to:

My Repurposed Life
The Cottage Market 
Funky Junk Interiors

aging painted metal signs

I've done a couple of posts now on how to make vintage-look painted signs on metal panels, but I'm still perfecting my methods as I work my way up to a large project. I have a patch of fence, though, in the backyard, that is chain link, and ugly, and has a tiny dog on the other side (a pomeranian, I think) who likes to bark at us when we're minding our own business in our own yard (but only when he can see us). And I had some metal panels laying around, ready to get made into signs.

A project for every purpose, hmmm?

So, let's not talk about how I should have used a template before taping and spraying so that everything would look a little more professional. I freehanded this in chalk and then taped around it; I know it doesn't exactly dress to impress. But I would like to write a little about my experiments with aging. Aging the sign, that is, not myself. (*wink*)

First, I started with a cream painted metal panel from Bring, the recycled building store where I pick up a lot of my project materials. As you can see in the sanded spot in the photo below, there were three other layers of paint under the cream: tan, brown, and gray before the steel shows through. Picking a panel with a lot of layers of old paint in dated colors is a great first step towards making something look vintage, I think.

After I taped my lines, I sprayed with a flat black primer, and then three very light coats of cherry red. Some of the black still shows through, with I think lends some nice age.

You can tell from the above photo there is a flat finish to the red paint. It was glossy out of the can, but if you hit anything with enough scrubber pads, sandpaper, and steel wool, you can dull the finish pretty nicely. 

As you see here, my next method to aging is to scrub all the way through the layers of paint in several areas, down to the bare metal. I made the patches somewhat random in order to look like "natural" aging. 

And then, of course, rust. I scrub the area with salt while it lays flat, then spray with vinegar and leave it to do its thing. Voila! (It's still wet in this photo, but you can still make it out.)

Ah, rust. I left this laying flat in the rain for a couple of days, which helps hasten the process.

I let the kiddo dance on it a bit, too, to give it some dents and chips.

So, the aging is going well, and this hides a pomeranian. Mission accomplished!

Stay tuned, as I'm in the middle of another sign project I'll be sharing soon. This one is even bigger and way cooler.

Thanks for reading!

another industrial pendant to complete the set

One of the first art lessons I still remember is the one in which we were introduced to the fact that in nature, things often occur in odd numbers (plant leafs, flower petals, etc.). It was an introduction to the Rule of Odds, which is used often in art and design to keep your brain interested and engaged, and you can find it in art from ancient Japan through the Renaissance all the way up through current day.

At the end of a previous lighting post, I mentioned that the idea for a certain spot in our house was to eventually have three hanging pendants for balance. That's the Rule of Odds at play in our living room.

Light number 1 was a five-cent frosted pendant.

Light number 2 was a metal cage light made with salvaged parts. (I've switched out the light kit since the original tutorial to accommodate a standard-sized Edison-style lightbulb.)

And this, the third, is was originally a plastic cage light, like this one, purchased used for 50 cents at Bring (but I've seen them similarly priced at the Habitat ReStore).

I hung it from a coat hanger in the yard and sprayed with gentle layers of primer, aluminum finish, and flat black spray paint to give it the look of aged metal.

Here are all three together at last:

I have them all hung by hooks from the ceiling. 

My original hope was to hard wire them all together, but since I lack the practical expertise for that, the cords run bundled down the edge of the window frame and are turned on and off via a power strip. I hope to get the curtains rehung to hide them a little better soon.

I've seen a few lighting solutions lately that involve swooping black cable and exposed bulbs and while I love the look in a loft space (like the one Brooks designed on DesignStar), it's not practical with 8-foot ceilings. I'd likely accidentally hang myself.

Okay, now you know what you need to know to diy three pendant lighting fixtures on a teeny tiny budget. Of course, if you have a bit more money you want to spend, you can buy industrial metal light cages:

1 Satco 90-1310 Lamp Cage

2 Metal Lamp Guard - Black

3 Vintage Drop Light

4 Industrial Wire Bulb Cage

And if the price isn't much of an issue:

5 Wire Cage Industrial Pendant

6 Vintage Industrial Cage Light

7 Metal Cage

8 Wire Cage Light

9 Early 20th Century Cage Lights

But in my house, I'm likely to spend the $1000 per fixture on that last link towards the mortgage or something else really practical, and hang up the diy version instead. How about you?

Thanks for reading!

Linking up to:

I'm Crafty!

Junkin' Joe at the Cottage Market

thrift store finds: mysterious metal box

Okay. You tell me: what is this thing?

Linking up to:

Junkin' Joe at the Cottage Market