155: Ways to Hack Your Ikea Furniture (Checkerboard Style)
I definitely wouldn’t consider myself a Swiftie. Saying that, I enjoy that Taylor can swap through her eras, trying out new styles all whilst remaining unashamedly Taylor Swift.
It took me a long time to find my style when it came to my home and to be honest I’ve got to a place where I’m really comfortable with it.
I’d describe it as soft-neutral-modern. I like including some antique vibes and balancing them with cooler textures, using combinations of concrete and marble. I like mixing my wood and my metals.
But right now, I think I’m in my colourful era. When I used to do colour it never worked for me long term because I think I went too bold with it. Now I feel more content with softer, earthier shades that still feel neutral.
I’m also enjoying pattern a little more. I love those glossy tiles in striped patterns and I absolutely bloody love checkerboard. Checkerboard floors, checkerboard tiles, checkerboard countertops.
It’s playful, it’s pretty and it doesn’t feel overly aggressive when it comes to pattern.
All images from Pinterest.
I wanted some in my home.
So, there’s a couple of parts to this story.
Well three actually;
I had an IKEA Malm dresser, which I used to have in my bedroom and then I swapped it out because it wasn’t exciting. I moved it to my office but it ruined the vibe and took up too much space. I couldn’t be bothered to sell it and I didn’t want to throw it away
A few years ago I went to an AirBnB. The woman that lived there was lovely. She had books of poetry, she could keep plants alive very successfully and, in her fridge she was fermenting her own kimchi. She also had a sideboard where she kept her homemade sourdough. When she fancied it, she’d have a slice of bread and butter with homemade jam. This bread table is my Roman Empire. I think about it at least once a month and have done for the past 6 years.
When I first decided I wanted to dip my toe into the world of interiors, I started upcycling furniture. It was therapy for me. Art on a bigger scale. I haven’t actually done it for ages so I wanted to see if it still held the same fun for me. (Spoiler: it does).
Upcycling my Ikea table was a no-brainer then wasn’t it? I spent some time researching how to make the checkerboard print and saved myself a few Pinterest inspiration images - as you do and as I would always recommend.
Then I took myself off to Homebase and collected my supplies.
I needed:
Frogtape. You can use any masking tape but I always feel a bit more assured that I’m going to get clean lines with this.
Annie Sloane paint pots in Pure and Primer Red. I wanted an earthy red, almost a brown and this one was perfect.
Wood effect contact paper in Medium oak.
The first thing I did, was clean up the table, dry it off and give the top a good coat of the Pure white paint. It was a little whiter than I had hoped and I wish I’d gone for a creamier colour, but it would do.
Once that had dried, I began my masking tape mission. I laid out rows of tape horizontally on the table. I used two strips of tape per row so the squares would be big enough and I used a spirit level to make sure I was laying them out straight. I left a gap the same width again between each row. I then did the same thing again but let my tape run vertically. This creates a very simple square pattern.
Then I gave the whole top a coat of white paint. Putting my base coat on top of the masking tape before I went in with my colour, meant that my lines were extra clean and there would be very minimal colour bleeding that I’d need to tidy up.
Once this had dried, I went over it with the Primer Red. It’s a strong colour and a good quality paint, so I only needed one coat. I was a little bored of watching paint dry by this point so I took a hair dryer to it to speed up the process.
I then got to peel off the masking tape, which was immensely satisfying and it left me with these perfect little squares. If I thought taking the tape off was good, then it was nothing compared to looking at these squares. Call me simple, but it scratched my brain in a good way. They were just so neat and I was thrilled.
But it wasn’t over yet. I went back in with my masking tape, this time laying it over the squares I had just painted, so I was left with the white parts visible.
At this point, I ran out of my whole roll of Frogtape and had to resort to whatever I could find in my cupboard. It still worked but it definitely wasn’t as clean.
I used my trick of painting over the edges with the Pure white first and dried it off with the hairdryer, before taking a final coat of Primer Red to it.
When I removed the masking tape this time, the whole pattern was revealed and it was fabulous! I couldn’t quite believe how easy it was and it was well worth the payoff. I had to do a couple of touch-ups but that didn’t take long at all.
The last thing to do was to use the contact paper to turn the legs from white melamine to warm oak. I’ve used contact paper before and I know it’s not a particularly tricky process. Simply cut the shapes out that you need to fit the surface and stick it on gently, squeezing out all the air bubbles as you go.
It was so easy. It went on like a dream, it fitted perfectly and it looked great.
Well, the first leg was anyway.
The second leg nearly made my brain fall out with the stress of it all. It was crinkly, and bubbly and uneven. It took me over an hour to cover the one table leg which, let’s face it, was just a massive rectangle and that’s the easiest shape to cover. I honestly, don’t know what happened.
And then I ran out of the stuff before I finished.
I waited a few days to get over it and the irritation the contact paper had caused me before I bought another roll. What made it worse was that I only needed to cover the drawer part, which was tiny. I considered painting it checkerboard too but ultimately decided that less is more. And this table was already quite a lot.
Once again, the contact paper did a fantastic job of lulling me into a false sense of security. The first piece that I cut to fit the drawer went up easily. The second piece did not. Worse than air bubbles, it seems, are creases.
But perseverance is key and I got there eventually.
I’m really pleased with how it turned out and I love that rich earth red colour. It fits in with my new colourful era but it still feels like me.
A few days later, I was having brunch with a friend when a woman walked in with Kefir water that she was making herself and she’d brought some to give to her brunch companion. We got talking and she, in her glorious star print jumpsuit and red beret, told us about her kefir and the tomatoes she was growing and of course, her sourdough bread. I think she was magical.
I explained to my friend about the need for my bread table and how I’d just upcycled one.
It was pointed out to me that I actually had to make the bread now. Painting a table so that I could make bread was top tier procrastination and it would have probably been quicker to just buy some flour.
She’s not wrong. But I still love my table.
