DIY Painted Hutch

Our dining room was in desperate need of a hutch.  I have very little storage in my kitchen and was sick of having to run down to the basement every time I needed serve ware.  My husband was dead set against the idea of a hutch and was even trying to convince me that we didn't have the space in the room (we do).  Our dining room table is the Benchwright from Pottery Barn and naturally I was scoping some Pottery Barn options.   My husband informed me that since I was taking time off from work to stay home with our son, a Pottery Barn hutch was not in the budget (which was really the true issue with not wanting a hutch).  Fortunately we have a wildly crafty DIY'er family friend who convinced me she'd find me a cheap hutch that we could re-do.  

A couple of weeks later she texts me these pictures from a local Habitat for Humanity ReStore.  I thought the thing was a total dog, however, it was forty bucks so what did I have to lose?

So our friend came over and gave me my first lesson in furniture painting.  We started by stripping the top because I wanted it to be darker to match my Benchwright table.  We then sanded, cleaned, stained, and varnished the top.  Once that was all dry we created a chalky textured paint using flat white paint, water, and plaster of Paris.  We removed all of the hardware and painted the whole piece white.  We spray painted the hardware black.  We then took sandpaper and mildly distressed the piece.  We applied Annie Sloan clear wax to seal the piece, re-attached the hardware and viola!  I'll have you know that my friend had all of the paint, stain, wax and supplies in the back of her car (because that's how she rolls) from previous projects.  So this hutch cost a grand total of 40 bucks.  Even if you were to purchase all of the supplies I'm sure the total would still be 100 or less.   And for the record my husband was very impressed and really loves the hutch.  Happy dance.