Joy Cho's DIY Dresser for the Nursery, and Beyond

By Joy Cho

Our Creative Producer & Stylist, Julia, has had this dresser in her home for over 10 years. Her husband purchased it as his first "adult" piece of furniture. It’s moved with him through several different apartments and now finally into his current home with Julia and their baby Zealand. Hoping to bring new life to the old dresser, Julia wanted to "Oh Joy it up" by refinishing and repainting it for her baby's room.

See how this dresser transformed from this to this...

• Spray paint primer
• Interior paint (we used colors mantis green and sundance yellow)
• Paint brush
• Painters tape
• Gold knobs

Here's how:

2. Once the primer is dry, paint a thick coat of white Advance Interior Paint. This paint takes 10-16 hours to dry and cure. The thicker the coat the more protection your dresser will have. We did three coats. You may need to sand in between coats (using low grit sand paper) if there are any visible drip marks.

3. When all coats are dry, you can start painting the stripes on the drawers. We used the .94 inch blue painters tape and covered the entire drawer with diagonal lines so that the lines would be consistent and even.

4. After all the drawers are taped; remove every other strip of tape to expose the areas you want to paint in a different color. Often when using painter's tape, the new paint color can bleed under the tape. To prevent this bleeding and to create a crisp line, we first painted over the entire drawer (exposed area and tape) with a thin coat of white paint.

5. Let that dry for at least 10 hours then paint over the drawers with your desired color. We chose to paint a mint green on one side and a pale yellow on the other, then added a second coat of paint after the first coat dried.

6. Once completely dry, remove the painters tape and add your knobs.

The great thing about a dresser is that it's a piece that can go from changing table to dresser to storage,staying in a child's life for a very long time. It's pretty cool to see a piece that was purchased by a single guy ten years ago now turn into a piece with which his daughter will grow.

Joy Cho is a paid spokesperson for HEALTHY ESSENTIALS^®