If you have been here a little while, you might know I am in the slowwww process of redouxing my Master Bedroom.  If this were evolution, and I was measuring my progress by ages, I would be in the Bronze age about now.  I am hoping to make the age of industry before the end of the summer (finis that is).

So far we have painted the walls Mindful Grey by  Sherwin Williams .  I shared this little sewing table turned nightstand with junque planks I put on top.

I redid this Country White Dresser to fit our modern/vintage look we are aiming for.

And now….I tackled the beast of the room.  The Built in bookshelf.  Mark and I are big readers, we have books coming out our ears.  We have several bookshelves crammed and we are constantly “editing”.  We also love to collect books as we add them to our reading list.  We used to have books stacked up in piles next to our bed, not a recommended decorating look.  We finally decided to splurge and have a bookshelf built in right under our big picture window.  The walls were formerly pale blue…..what to paint the built in?  Coral of course?!   Isn’t this everyone’s go-to color?

This falls under the heading of “what was I thinking”.

Once it was painted, I liked it for about a week.  We have lived with it this way for two years now.  The last few months the built in and I were barely on speaking terms and I was starting to not like my books for hanging out with it either.

I finally did something about this.  I began by painting the entire piece CeCe Caldwell’s Hershey Brown.  Two coats was all it took to almost erase all the coral.  I didn’t mind some of it showing through as it would provide some red tones I wanted to preserve.

Next I used Modern Master’s Colorant, “Coffee Bean Brown”. I happen to really like this product, but any really high quality acrylic paint, with high pigmentation will work. I did a heavy “dry brush” technique with the colorant.  Meaning I loaded up a chip brush, but not as much  as I would if were painting, I then lightly brushed the colorant all over the bookshelf, giving the piece dimension and a “stained” look.  I used that quite a bit when I shared how to make anything look like wood in THIS POST.

I did another small piece of furniture with this same technique, will be sharing this on Wednesday, so stay tuned.

When this was dry, I finished the entire piece off with a dark wax and buffed.  Oh yes, I also knocked out two of the shelves.  It was making my built in look all choppy.  The only thing that would fit in those places were all cheap paperback novels.  (I put all those away for the photo shoot………..)

Now I have room for our “smart” books, and my fertility guy from Hawaii.  Hey, it worked didn’t it?  I have twins.

I added baskets I had on hand to the bottom shelves.  These are holding our books that we will “some day” read.  This is my side.  (The Dreamers book I read occasionally after a night a “très étrange” dream).  Sort of insightful, like why I keep dreaming about suddenly finding myself living in a town right on the ocean.  Wishful dreaming.

The only thing that used to be on the top of the built in was extra books, and a water color, unframed, laying there sadly, done by my Great Aunt Sadie.  Sorry!  I will frame it this week, I promise!  Oh yes, and a sort of red tinted Pumpkin Holiday candle.  (No clue why this was still here, it sort of blended into the entire piece and literally became part of the furniture). I added Mark’s Birch Bark canoe (a gift from me some years ago, no I did not make it, I am crafty, but not of the birch bark kind).  Some favorite pictures, and the roses just came from our yard today.

I am so thrilled with the finish.  I went from a Miami Beach Cabana (not that there is anything wrong with this look), to a distinguished grown up bedroom look.

And my books and I are now living happily ever after.  The End.