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We bought a lovely Australian 1930's Art Deco display cabinet in a dusty antique shop as newly-weds and cheerfully brought her home in the back of our ute. She had pride of place in our first home which was built in 1935 but was completely out of place in our current 1970's house. After 20 years she was relegated to a corner and used as storage.
Over time the ply peeled and a couple of leadlight panels broke, dust filled the cabinet which was now an eyesore.
When we started renovating our living room, I tried to give the poor old cabinet away to a friend who was doing a leadlight workshop and could have fixed it. She said no because the wood colour wouldn’t match her furniture.
It was time to visit the dump and declutter a part of our history. But first...a cuppa and raisin toast at Bunnings North Toowoomba which is kind of on the way.
Hubby remembered he needed to visit the tool shop so I dived into the paint aisle only to come face to face with the darling little Porter’s Paints sample jars. When I saw Yacht Race, a flash of inspiration struck. We didn’t need a display case, but boy did we need a bar cabinet for when our now grown up boys came home for Christmas.
He just sighed as another jar of paint slid up to the counter under his new demo tool. But at least we didn’t have to go to the dump.
Looking at the display cabinet was almost painful, the glass broken, the mirrors peeling, everything held together with tiny rusty nails. Time to YouTube some inspiration. Several videos later a plan developed. The broken panes could be replaced. The mirror could be jazzed up with wallpaper.
After a relaxing glass of red we started to plan.
"We'll have to pull the whole thing apart, " my husband said, relishing the chance to use his demo tool so soon, "but we do need to go out for coffee and a Trojan glass cutter. And a box of nails."
We searched Blue Art Deco Wallpaper online and found the perfect one.
The next day we pulled the entire cabinet apart and I had a great time sanding it before my multi talented husband painted it that incredibly rich and deep navy - Yacht Race.
He also taught himself leadlighting and surprised me by scraping the peeling mirror and cutting it to size before installing it. He said recycling the original mirror just felt right and would look better than brand new glass.
Only a week later, our wallpaper arrived from the UK!!! It was glorious. But something was missing. We forgot the adhesive. "Oh no," I laughed. "We have to go to Bunnings."
After our favourite coffee and raisin toast, followed by a wander through the nursery, we headed for the paint aisles where a nice young man found the Superfresco Easy wallpaper paste for us.
The wallpaper went on smoothly and the reviews were right about the paste being slippery but holding superbly. The whole thing was starting to look so exciting that I took photos in the dark and sent them to our boys who said it already looked like a party waiting to happen but where were the lights?
LIGHTS!!! My favourite things. We had fairy lights and long LED strips but this project required something more professional. Something we just didn’t have. I obsessed over lights and scrolled through the Bunnings website until I found just the thing - lytworx neonflex. They were just the right size, flexible, USB or battery operated and easy to install.
Downlights made a huge difference and really brought our project to life.
The finishing touch was the jewellery for our grand old lady - a silver and black pull handle.
From an eyesore we have created a fun talking point for our next Christmas party.
Hello @Helen9
Welcome to the Bunnings Workshop community. It's a pleasure having you join us, and thank you for sharing your art deco cabinet makeover.
Thank you very much for sharing such a wonderful story about your art deco cabinet. I'm glad you decided to give this piece a second chance to become useful again. It would have been a shame to see it go to the tip. Porters paint is top notch and the photos don't do it justice, I've seen the yacht race colour the finish is probably gorgeous. The wallpaper and the lights really add to the personality of the cabinet. I'm glad you managed to save the original glass fronts.
Again, thank you for sharing your beautiful art deco cabinet project.
Eric
