Blooming Rose Dresser

This dresser is the last client project I took on(before we move). She is now my cute babysitter and I wanted this dresser to be perfectly suited for her. We decided on a gray dresser so that it would go with her room and new bedding. She chose some new cream/white/grey blue bedding. I had the dresser painted this grey color (French linen) and was ready to just sand it to make it look a little older but, something else needed to be done…

and I came up with this monochromatic graphic blooming rose. (more about that later)

The original dresser. Cream/gold fabulousness….okay not really but, it did have great bones to start with!

I knew her original lamp wasn’t going to work anymore and I had seen a bubble lamp would be just perfect. I hopped over to Target and bought this beautiful glass bubble lamp with a graphic shade. I debated about whether to do a white/ivory shade and go “safe” but, I decided I loved the blue/green/grey color and it would work great with her bedding. Go bold, I decided!

I had a vision of a globe roses (or carnations) and a small glass something to hold her necklaces.

I was walking to the register in Target with the lamp and saw this cute sugar bowl. I loved it’s size and shape and knew it was going to be more than just a sugar bowl. It could hold her jewelry. (plus it was around $3…bonus!). The white flowers in the silver pot are actually from the dollar store of all places. I was hoping to find a small pewter vase and found this ceramic one instead. It was a cobalt blue color so I used some left over aluminum spray paint and painted it silver. I cut all of the stems to the exact same length which, when put in a vase, gives this globe or half circle look to the flowers. They definitely don’t look like dollar store flowers now….they’ve been upgraded!

This is the dresser all done with the pillow sham sitting on top that she let me borrow so I could color match.

I got this fabric image from a blog I happen to have stumbled upon and she had used it as inspiration to paint a bright hot pink, purple, green rose on a baby nursery’s dresser. As soon as I saw it….I envisioned it, not in bright colors but, in a monochromatic taupe, grey and cream colors for my client’s dresser. I now needed a projector to finish the project. With my 40% off coupon in hand, Hobby Lobby had the projector I needed.

I traced the image of a rose onto the dresser with a pencil. Then it was like my kids painting books of “paint by numbers”.

I painted the cream, then the grey inside color and lastly I used a darker brown/grey color for the middle of the rose. I added some of the annie sloan chalk paint to the hardware to keep them monochromatic with the dresser.

and this is how it turned out….two nap times and a lot of steady hand painting later! A beautiful Blooming Rose!

Finally the dresser was waxed in a clear annie sloan wax to protect this beauty!

My client came and picked up the Blooming Rose Dresser yesterday and it was priceless seeing her face. I felt like Santa Claus on Christmas. She absolutely loved it and it is perfect for her. She exudes the simple elegance that I hoped to portray in her dresser! Isn’t it pretty?