Hi, this is Karen from A house full of sunshine. Today I’ll be showing you how I breathed new life into a tired old mirror – quickly and cheaply!
This mirror was a wedding present well over a decade ago. Back in the day, Moroccan-style mirrors with cage doors were a hot trend. Until, a few years later, they weren’t. This mirror was a solid, good quality piece, but the has-been styling was seriously dating our home. We eventually moved the mirror into storage until we figured out what we wanted to do with it. And there it remained for the next four and a half years.
Then, one day, it occurred to me how easy it would be to bring this mirror back on trend.
The biggest issues I had with it were those doors – 90’s harem style, anyone? – and the painted woodwork everywhere, which makes the mirror look too busy. But both of those things are easily fixed.
First, I removed the doors. The hinges took a bit of prying and levering with a screwdriver and pliers, but they eventually popped off. Aaaahhhh – better already. Fancy being able to actually see a reflection in a mirror! What a novelty.
I sanded down the holes left by the hinges being pried loose.
… then spackled the holes.
I taped and cling-wrapped the mirror in preparation for spray-painting. Then I gave the frame a coat of Rust-o-leum spray paint in Gloss Black.
After the first coat dried, I went over the whole surface with fine grade steel wool. Then I added a second coat of spray paint.
This is when the glossy brilliance of the paint really began to shine through.
All of that intricate fretwork which looked so tired and busy before, is now unified and simplified by the black paint. Paring back the color palette puts the focus squarely on the beautiful patterns and flourishes in the frame.
A simple update that cost only a few dollars for a can of spray-paint and took a matter of minutes to execute. Now, instead of looking dated and woebegone in a storage facility someplace, my lovely mirror is looking hip and sophisticated as it takes pride of place in our entry.
I’m just kicking myself that I didn’t do it sooner!
I’m part of a Fall home tour this week, and I’d love you to pop over to A house full of sunshine on Thursday for the first complete home tour I’ve shared in our new home. I have lots of beautiful spaces I’ve been working hard to finish, and I can’t wait to share them with you! If you want to be sure you don’t miss the post, you can subscribe here to receive my posts in your inbox. I share home decorating and DIY projects, kids activities, recipes and other home-making goodness.
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Thanks for having me today!
Kim says
Love the mirror! It looks so beautiful! I did something similar. I had a round mirror in my bathroom that was brown. I decided that it would look great above my bed against the dark brown accent wall. So I spray painted it silver to match my side lamps. It came out so nice and really made the wall pop!
Karen @ a house full of sunshine says
That sounds gorgeous, Kim!