Upcycling a Bridgerton style miniature chest of drawers with WoodUbend and Posh Chalk Aqua Patinas

A dramatic piece of Bridgerton style furniture

There’s nothing we like more at WoodUbend than a period drama. Not only do we love following the story, but it gives us a chance to ogle the amazing furniture that the producers have used to recreate the scenes.

The popularity of Bridgerton continues to increase each time Netflix launches a new series, so it was with this in mind that Solly Jo recently decided to take an old chest of drawers and give it the Bridgerton treatment!

We found a lovely looking miniature chest of drawers on Facebook marketplace which we quickly bought for the princely sum of £20. Might have been a lot back in the 1820’s, but hardly much these days!

This chest sported some lovely French style curves and was certainly a great starting point. But, we wanted to bring it bang up to date with some exotic colours…this was going to be a job for Posh Chalk Aqua Patinas! We envisioned a stunning paint job using Solly Jo’s signature blended paint effect plus some WoodUbend trims and appliques to liven up the chest. Here’s how we did it!

Starting the Bridgerton Style project

The first thing to do was to take the miniature chest back to its base. Using a sander, we removed most of the original colour to give us a bare starting point.

Sanding the Bridgerton cabinet — Solly Jo prepares the Bridgerton style cabinet

Once we had something of a blank canvas, it was time to start applying WoodUbend. We chose a centrepiece applique, WUB 1301 decorative plaque. In fact we chose two, as we wanted to cover the height of the chest-front with the applique. So, we mirrored the moulding by inverting the top one, and chopping off the very top of it to ensure a perfect fit.

WoodUbend and Bridgerton Style cabinet — Adding WoodUbend appliques

It was amazing how placing this unadorned piece of WoodUbend quickly started the transformation process. We were now getting really excited to see how the project would develop.

Now, obviously we wanted to ensure that the drawers would still be able to open once our work was finished. One of the great things about WoodUbend is its versatility. When warm, you can chop, slice, bend and stretch to your heart’s content! So, with a little heat from a hair dryer, we warmed up the appliques. Then, taking a crafter’s scalpel, we simply cut through the applique to fit with the drawers.

The flexibility of WoodUbend means that you can get a very precise cut, so only a small bit of sanding was needed to have the applique line up perfectly with the drawers.

WoodUbend and Bridgerton cabinet — Getting the WoodUbend to fit on the cabinet

However, we didn’t stop there with the WoodUbend as we wanted to ensure that the rest of the miniature chest of drawers would also be suitably embellished. So we took one of our favourite WoodUbend trims – TR721 – and heated it up using our trusty heat gun. When warm, WoodUbend becomes entirely flexible in your hands, meaning that you are able to apply it to your project of choice in a single, unbroken strip. We applied wood glue to the back of the trim, then, whilst still warm, carefully wrapped it around the base of the cabinet and waited until it had cooled and adhered.

Adding some colour

Our miniature chest of drawers was still looking very plain and a bit, well, sad really. It was time to add some colour!

We thought carefully about which colours to use. We could keep it low-key, and use a selection of muted tones. But, this being Solly Jo, we decided to go all-out for pizzazz!

With this in mind, we selected two complementary colours from La Magic paint: Serendipity and Cherry. Using a Posh Chalk Paintbrush, we carefully applied a blend of the two colours to ravishing effect.

Solly’s blended technique was being put to the test here, to make sure that not only were we giving our miniature chest of drawers some real pep, but also depth and resonance too!

Painting the Bridgerton style cabinet — Applying paint to our cabinet

The impact of Aqua Patinas

Posh Chalk is a range of artisan-quality coatings. Amongst the range are Aqua Patinas and Pigments. The beauty of using these products is that it gives you free reign to create the colours, tones and depths of your choice.

We selected three aqua patinas from the range to add colour: Red Medium Cadmium, Violet and Primary Green. By mixing these together we were able to produce an intense colour to add to our drawers.

The beauty of Posh Chalk Aqua Patinas is that, because they are water based, they have unique blending properties. Perfect for our furniture upcycling project.

Stencilling the sides and adding pigments

We were still of the opinion that the sides needed some attention. Whilst the deep plum colour was great, it needed something else. So, we selected a Posh Chalk stencil – ‘Mystery Thorns’ – one of our best sellers. By applying the stencil to the side and taping it in place, we were free to add another colour.

We mixed two Posh Chalk pigments – silver and copper – with our high-quality Posh Chalk Infusor to get a lustrous champagne colour. Very high-end!

With a stippling technique, we applied the mixture to the gaps in the Mystery Thorns stencil. A stippling technique helped to get a really clean image through the stencil by ensuring all of the nooks and crannies were covered. Then, by carefully removing the stencil, we unveiled the newly-adorned sides which seem to glow against the plummy background.

All Posh Chalk stencils are manufactured from high-grade materials, so they can be washed simply under a warm tap and used again time after time.

Neat, eh?