Ikea Rast Hack

Hi, you all!!

This is a long overdue post, I really took my time with my project and now I am so proud of how it turned out.
Teaser photo:

Don't scroll down!!:)

 It was not easy, though, it took a lof of changing my mind, experimenting, trying to find the time to do it, as with two young daughters that don't stay put for a second, it is preety difficult. I've started this project I think three weeks ago or so, normally I'd finish it sooner, but my skedule didn't allow me to speed up the process.

I have a handful of blogs I read with pleasure. Home decor blogs. Kelly from Jax does design is really a source of inspiration for me. I found her a while ago and she is one of the reasons I got the courage to go into  DIY. So, thank you, Kelly!!

This post is going to be a very long and detailed one so you'd better prepare :))

It all started with Ikea. I had never been there until I had to go to spy the bedroom for the girls' room. I was satisfied with the quality so after a week I went there to buy the bedroom... I bought something else too... I bought this:

Rast

It's made of untreated wood, which allowed me to paint!! Yeeey, I love painting!! It relaxes me a lot!! Already having exercised my assembly skills with the girls' bedroom, I took a shot at assembling it, and succeeded! They say two people should assemble it, but I managed to do it alone and quietly while the girls were napping! I wanted to color him a bit and chose a red wine color from Kober. I wanted to be a bit more colorful, and I wasn't really excited with the color, but hey, you work with what you've got! After the first coat I let it dry and then sanded; it looked like this (and sorry for the quality of the pictures, I painted it during the night after the girls went to sleep)

 I had plans to style it up a bit, as it was way too plain, and I ordered over the internet some of these:

These strips of decorated wood are sooo nice. I oredered them from this place: Naturtrend. They were a bit pricey but they definitely served their purpose of styling up my Rast! It went from looking like this:

to this:

I had to cut those strips of wood, and it was not an easy job, as it required both strenght and skills, so I kissed my hubby again, marvelled at his muscles this thime :)) and he helped me. He made some metal thingy which helped him cut the wood at a 45 degree angle, it took a while but the result was great! Yeeey, hubby!

This is his metal tool for cutting at a 45 degree angle ( and a piece of my old pyjamas..)



We glued the strips to the drawers, and it started to look great! It really started to come together! I was suuuper excited!!

Very professional of me, I added my daughter's soy milk and the softener to hold in place the strips of wood!! :)) Oh, and a lot of Disney books!! :)

The result at this stage was nice, don't you think?

Next it was time to paint again! I painted the drawers the same red wine color.

The color seems so different because of the light. Painting took place in my tiny balcony, it was preety unconfortable, but hey, I'm not complaining!!

I used a bit of black for the base under the silver, so it would add dimension and depth.

I originally wanted to use these knobs from Zara Home, but after I bought them I noticed that they didn't do anything for my Rast and it didn't look so great. So I decided not to use them!! Sorry for the money, they were not at all cheap!! I'll keep them for other projects!

After the decoration was glued and the drawers were painted red, I covered the drawers with metallic paint, using a piece of cloth, a paintbrush  and ...well, my fingers. The idea is to make it uneven, tapping, rubbing and 'caressing' the surface to get the metallic look.

Well, I ended up NOT liking it... So I had to change plan. Red was out! Black ( I guess you saw this coming..) was in!! I painted, sanded, painted and sanded again and again!!

Here is how the drawers looked after painting them with black paint and sanding them (I sanded manually )

I loved the finish after sanding so I left it like this, I didn't add any gloss on it.

I really like this aged look!

The light from the phone makes it so glossy, but it has a more matte finish in real life.

Here is it all black!!

For creating the metallic finish I used metallic paint, using a very small amount of paint on the brush.

I used this sponge to help me take the smallest amount of paint I could to be able to create the sheer finish I wanted.

My balcony smelled like crazy!!

I wanted to spice it up with some tacks that I painted silver ( they were brownish ) but changed my mind and didn't use them in the end.

Here is my beautiful Rast waiting patiently for the pulls to arrive... (I ordered them from this place: eshop)

Isn't he cute?

LOVE the details and the sheen!

These are the pulls I chose (mix your metallics, I say!)

And now it was time to wait. It has been 3 days since I finished the Rast and now I've received the pulls, but I don't really have the courage to drill the holes.. waiting for the hubs, who, as always is veeeerrry busy and doesn't have the time to do it! For the next project I'll do it myself!

Funny thing about those pulls!! Kelly, you were my inspiration for updating the Ikea Rast. But the materials you have access there are better than ours here, or I haven't found them yet here, so I just looked at the pictures from your blog three weeks ago and thought how I could do it with materials from Romania. I did it, and in the end I started looking for the pulls! I ordered mine over the internet and.. imagine my SURPRISE when I noticed they were almost the same. I must have subconsciously remembered yours :) They are from the same company and they are sold here too. Yeeey!!

So, this is the moment of truth!! Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you my Greek Key Romanian Rast:

So, like it or not? And be gentle with my baby:))
P.S. If you' d  like to have your own Rast, I can help you! We can go white and gold (I have already spotted the perfect pulls!), we can use colors, for children or for you!! I could also recreate the Rast I've just showed you!! Just let me know!!
Daca doresti sa ai in casa ta un astfel de Rast sau altul, asa cum ti-l imaginezi tu, contacteaza-ma!!

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Posted By House@heart to House@heart at 11/29/2012 09:18:00 PM