How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

Kate K. gives us a walk through on How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture.

This is her story.

I had this piece sitting around for a long while, waiting for both time and inspiration to come.  It was an old piece and had seen better days, so there was some repair work to be done before refurbishing it.

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

I could have stained it, but it was in our shop and I don’t like to have the odor of stains permeating through our beautiful store.  Plus,  there were so many dings and dents, I decided I was going to paint it with American Paint Company paints.    The next big decision was how I wanted to paint it.   We talked about layering it with different colors so the final results would have pops of color peeking through and then perhaps adding some details.   Well, THAT didn’t happen.  Apparently the piece wanted to be something different, so we rolled with it.

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

When we laid on the first color Sackcloth we could see within a few minutes the piece was going to have some bleed through.   The color coming through was yellowish, almost looked like rust in some spots.   We could have stopped and sealed it with shellac, a sealing primer, polyurethane or even APC’s Top Coat, but I kind of liked the character of the tannins showing through and it changed the design I had in my head, which was good.  I needed to break out of my comfort zone and go for something other than red or black.

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

This is NOT a color we chose, it’s bleed through. I actually like it.  You can see the more the piece dried, the stronger the yellow/rust bleeding showed.   A lot of older furniture will have this issue and you can test the piece to see if you will have to deal with it before you paint by using a spray bottle of water or a paint brush to brush water onto the piece and then lay a paper towel or sprinkling baking soda over the damp furniture – any bleed through will become apparent as the paper towel/baking soda soaks up the water.   Then you can decide if you want to seal it before painting.

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

Using Amber Waves of Grain and Smoke Signal, a design began to take shape. The first step in what I had in mind with this newly imagined finish was to create a backdrop for a bee and laurel design.   Once the paint was dry, it was time to get out the sandpaper and go to work.

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

Heavy distressing gave this piece even more character.

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

We worked with the bleed through.  The final step was to wax it with American Paint Company’s Clear Wax, then mixed Plymouth Rock with the Clear Wax and pushed it into the crevices and details.

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

Plymouth Rock mixed with clear wax created a great white wax effect to highlight the details.  Now the piece sits nicely in our shop with a new companion, waiting for someone to take them home.

How To Fix Bleed Through when Chalk Painting Furniture

Hope this inspires you to “just roll with it!”

Thank you Kate, this is an inspiring piece.

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Comments

  1. Great article. I didn’t know the water, baking soda and paper towel tip. Great tip, I’m going to try that.

  2. VERY NICE!! This piece worked out well going with the bleed through the way that you did it. Thanks for the tip on how to test for bleed through before painting on an old piece.

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