School Daze

Months ago, I snarfed two California King bed frames off Craigslist. They’ve been leaning up against the wall in our dining room ever since. One’s gorgeous – a light pine with some cool scrolls and details. The other’s nice but simpler and a little darker. I’ve been thinking about painting it but wanted to see it in place before I decided. Last weekend we brought them up.

Pine is fine - but I'm pretty sure it will be happier white

We set up both bedframes. The first bed looked great – the light pine is a perfect complement to the greeny bedroom and contrasts nicely with the floor. The second bed didn’t look right in the cream and aqua with white trim bedroom, and was almost the same color as the floor.  My husband walked in while I was contemplating it. He looked at me and said, “Whatcha doin?” I pointed to the bed and said, “I think it wants to be white.” He smiled indulgently and said, “Well, I’ll just leave you two to work it out,” and went down to hang cabinets in the basement.

Primed

Here’s the thing: furniture talks to me. If I watch and listen long enough, it will usually tell me what it wants to be. Painted furniture often wants to be stripped and sanded. Wood furniture sometimes wants to be painted. Sometimes it wants something unusual. When I first met my husband he had a hideous coffee table to which he was unnaturally attached. I told him he could keep it if he let me paint it. It ended up black laced with gold accented by Mexican Loteria images and rhinestones. We still have it.

Coffee table with Loteria images and rhinestones

Detail of top

Maybe I’ve been spending too much time with Country Living but – the bed’s white and it looks perfect. And more important, it’s happy – I know because it told me so.

What it wanted to be