This post is sponsored by National Business Furniture. All opinions are 100% my own. Thank you for supporting the brands we truly love!
Our Carolina Room is just not serving us the way we had intended it to. After using this room for about 2 years now we realized a few things: We need more storage, better kid friendly furniture, make it more plant friendly since it’s a “sunroom”,
You can check out the Carolina Room Before here when it was a brown bland box!
Buy to DIY
My design style is functional design, everything we have in our home needs to serve a purpose as well as be stylish. So we got rid of our old media console that I built a few years ago and scooped up the Metal Wire Mesh Storage Credenza from National Business Furniture that we put a little DIY spin on! Yes, y’all heard that right we are doing a “Buy to DIY” project.
I surveyed y’all while we were working on this project and 76% of you would Buy to DIY. So what’s the definition of “Buy to DIY” you ask? Well, in simplest terms it’s buying a product to ultimately alter the appearance – that could even be as small as replacing hardware on a piece of furniture!
This piece has a very industrial feel which our home does not, however, I really liked the piece and thought adding a little paint would turn it into the classic piece I was envisioning for this space.
Painting 101
I set up my spray tent to paint! I decided to paint all the wood the same color as the metal, black. The wood was MDF with wood like vinyl so I decided to go with Rust-Oleum Spray Paint that works for wood, metal, plastic, and more!
The doors to the credenza were like a hammered metal so I scooped up some hammered spray paint that would give the other pieces some texture. Turns out it just made it look like I gave it a really bad paint job! You always learn something new with DIY, y’all.
I found it was easier to paint all the pieces I needed to before assembling.
Initially I was going to leave the entire piece black, but the brick wall is already black in the Carolina Room, so I thought we’d need to break it up just a tad. I decided to add white to the interior of the credenza and it gave the whole piece a new look! It went from industrial to classic with just a little paint. Oh yes my friends, Buy to DIY is about to be a regular thing around these parts.
Since the cabinet is MDF vinyl laminate and metal I had to add about 4 coats of paint with a sponge cabinet/furniture roller and a 1.5″ brush for cutting in. Be sure to use a primer before starting in on your color. Zinsser or Kilz has great primers for these types of metal projects!
There’s always a point in a project where you think you made a terrible decision and this was definitely it. This was only one coat but I for sure thought this was the worst idea I’ve had in a while. But, I decided to finish painting and when I was done I’d find out if white was a bad idea.
That’s a negative on that one Nancy, the white and black combination was such a GOOD idea!
Before
Let’s take a look at what this room looked like before we decided to give it a refresh…
After
The after just brings a big smile to my face. Let’s just take a minute to take in this whole scene.
The credenza paired with the Kathy Ireland Vintage Rug was perfect to balance out all the black in the Carolina Room. I ended up moving the DIY Kids Table over here in the corner to add some wood elements and I don’t know why I didn’t think about it the first time around!
We went with the 9×12 rug to give Liv enough room to play with her toys and play dates with friends.
The credenza now houses movies, emergency diapers/wipes, books, and some extras for guest. Yes, you read that right. This Carolina Room is a playroom, but also doubles as a guest room with a sofa bed.
We needed to add an end table for guests to be able to use as a nightstand so we grabbed the Parquet Veneer Top End Table. It has a Driftwood Finish Top with a Rose Gold Base. I thought about painting the base, but it ended up going even better with the vintage rug.
Since it’s Spring we decided to bring the plants back to the Carolina Room and boy do they love it back here. We even decided to add a 4th shelf to the bottom and it’s like lipstick finishing off this refresh.
We also scooped up this TI-Resin Hammered Lamp for this space, but it found a good home in Cash’s Nursery. What do you think?
The plan was to utilize our Carolina Room a bit better for our kids and guests, so we swapped out the rug, got a better storage system and added A LOT of paint! Thanks to National Business Furniture for letting me put my DIY spin on things, because this space turned out so great. Liv is already loving her new playroom, y’all!
Our friends over at National Business Furniture gave us a discount code for y’all to refresh your homes for Spring, use code: DESIGN10 for 10% off your purchase!
Buy to DIY Supplies:
- Rust-Oleum Spray Paint for Metal, Wood, Plastic, and More!
- Cabinet Interior Primer: Zinsser or Kilz (Water based requires more coats of paint vs Oil based)
- Cabinet Interior Paint: Polar Bear by Behr Paint
- Sponge Cabinet/Door Roller
- Plastic Paint Tray Liner
- Paint Tray
- 1.5″ Angled Brush
Get the Look
- Ceiling Paint Color: Ultra Pure White by Behr
- Brick Wall Paint Color: Black Noir by Behr, Exterior Matte for Masonry
- Metal Wire Mesh Storage Credenza (Similar, Similar)
- Parquet Veneer Top End Table (Similar, Similar, Similar)
- Kathy Ireland Vintage Rug 9×12 (Similar, Similar, Similar)
- Kids Table DIY (Tutorial Coming Soon)
- Kids Wishbone Chairs
- White Sleeper Sofa
- Brown Throw Pillows – Lucky Collective
- Table Lamp (Old TJMaxx Find from 2016)
- Black Ceiling Fan
- Wooden Rocking Horse – Vintage Find
- Floor Pouf
- Wooden Building Blocks
- Credenza Baskets (At Home Store)
- Concrete Planter
- Seagrass Planter Basket
- Black Planter (At Home Store)
Let me know if you have any questions about anything building wise or product questions! I’m an open book 
For more behind the scenes on all of our DIY and home projects be sure to follow along on instagram. To see all of our inspo and upcoming projects be sure to follow along on pinterest.
