Dresser Revived (cont.): Retro Navajo

My day started off with a trip to the Salvation Army store downtown.  I walked in hoping to find a unique chair, nostalgic knickknacks of sorts or perhaps a small table to appease me. After pretending to be interested in the used teacups in aisle 2, the distant furniture section caught my eye.  I followed the main path formed by the large pieces that were brought in earlier that day and decided that nothing was worth my penny.  THEN, I spotted it, as if it were whispering my name...
Enough with the story telling, I'll just get to the point.  I found a dresser priced at $79, left the store, went home to get Dave's truck and headed back to pick it up.  Here are some before shots:



A little Mid-Century Modern never hurt anyone... what can I say, I love furniture with feet.

When I brought it back to the house, I realized that what I thought was solid wood was wood veneer (eek!).  I don't know how to work with veneer, never had, never thought I would.  So I took a shot at sanding it anyway and it actually worked out very nicely, perhaps even a little easier than if it were solid.

Overall this project took me about a month and a half of weekend days to get it to the point it is today.  Needless to say, I'm very happy with the way it turned out and a little sad that I might be posting it on Craigslist (to justify a recent self-indulgement).  On one hand, I hope it would sell because I could definitely use the money, but on the other hand, it looks so right in my guest bedroom.... :-/ dilemma dilemma.

Front: I stained the dresser a darker color to bring out the paint colors I'd be using.  The hardware was cleaned with warm soapy water, lightly sanded and sealed to look shiny again.

Side: The design on the side was something I came up with after looking at several Native American rugs  [that, by the way, is another item on my shopping list] and the colors are some of my all time favorites which I already had samples of in the garage that were still 3/4 of the way full.  The trim around the design was something that I knew I wanted to do.  At first, I was going to make the job easier by framing some fabric but, of course, I couldn't decide on a fabric to use so I ended up being inspired by Navajo rugs instead... hmmm?

Close-up of hardware... very age of the Jetson's, don't you think?