Refinishing a Chest of Drawers Found on the Street

Recently, while walking to the neighborhood library, I found a chest of drawers, or dresser in an alley with a free sticker on it. It was in rough shape. The paint was falling off, it was scratched, and the drawers' tracks were worn thin. San Francisco for whatever reason seems to be the land of setting stuff on the street and hoping someone takes it. I guess it's because a lot of the time people do take it. Well, that day on my way back from the library, I became the person to take the street junk. I shouldn't act like that is out of character for me. Much of our apartment is furnished from stuff we've found on the street, and sometimes if we are feeling fancy, stuff we've purchased secondhand. It's a bit of a game, kind of like dumpster diving. Sometimes, you go for a walk and there's some great find right around the corner!

One of my favorite finds was an antique dresser manufatured by Sligh over 100 years ago. It had seen better days, but the piece was still beautiful. It had this warmth to it. You could feel it's age in it's character. Something about the way it had worn would speak to me when I opened it. I'd think about all the hands that dresser had passed through, and I'd think how many more hands will it go through.

That last part is really important to me. This piece of furniture has been around for 100 years, how many more years does it have left? The Sligh dresser was set on the street for trash pickup, so it had just about seen it's last trip around the Sun. I feel purpose in saving these things and redressing them so they can continue to be loved.

We didn't end up keeping that dresser. I spent a lot of time repairing the drawer slides, fixing up cracks and finishes, but it was ultimately just too big for our room. However it was enjoyed thoroughly for the year and a half we had it. And it makes me happy to know I was able to pass it on to someone else, who I hope is continuing to use it. I enjoyed breathing life back into this centenarian object.

So when I saw the chest of drawers by the library, I felt ready for my next dresser restore. This one was in worse shape than the last one, particularly the finish.

Someone had clearly tried painting over an old finish that was wearing. Sometimes that works. Most of the time I think without addressing the original finish properly you're going to run into problems.

Underneath the paint, it looked like some sort of surface finish, maybe a spar varnish. Not sure.

I scraped off most the paint and finish by hand with a scraper, then in delicate areas I used Citristrip. If you want to do furniture repair, avoid using chemical strippers as much as possible. It doesn't make your life as easy as you'd hope. They make huge messes, and they are just disgusting to work with, even the ones that are supposedly more "natural". Try and get as much done by hand as possible. It will take some elbow grease, but maybe that's just a way to save yourself from a gym membership.

So with most of the finish removed, The wood had some discoloration from stains and some difficult areas still needed to be cleaned up. Luckily for me, the dresser was all solid wood. The construction of the chest is very simple solid wood and butted up joints nailed together. A little utilitarian when compared to some fancy dovetail drawers, but whatever, I like it for what it is. Since it was all solid, I could sand it to heck. The top also needed some planing since it had cupped. It was kind of strange the way the top was adhered and warped.

I'm pretty sure it was replaced after the original construction. The top appears to be Poplar. I'm still learning to identify woods, but I think the rest of the body is either cherry or soft maple. May also poplar :shrug:.

With everything all cleaned up and sanded to 180 grit, I applied some Total Boat Halcyon amber water-based polyurethane. I really enjoy working with this stuff because it's so hard to mess it up. It goes on real nice, with a cool gloss, and I don't have to worry so much about VOC's when working with it. Clean up is also simple since it is water based and can be brushed on. However, it's quite expensive. When I last bought it, a quart was $46 on Amazon!

Anyway, without further ado, here's the final product! Notice some of the drawers are sagging, I think I can replace the drawer slides at a later date, but for now I'm happy to lubricate it with a little wax and call them good.